


Not Intended

by fasterchanyeol



Category: EXO (Band)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-01
Updated: 2018-04-30
Packaged: 2019-04-30 12:40:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 32,788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14497209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fasterchanyeol/pseuds/fasterchanyeol
Summary: In an attempt to settle a three generation family feud, Baekhyun has to marry someone from the other family. Being the silently rebellious son that he is, he decides to ditch home two days before a formal meeting was suppose to take place. He runs off with nothing but his wallet, some cash, and his I.D. Knowing that being on the streets would make it more likely of him being found—with the connections of a friend—Baekhyun ends up being the maid of a large villa on the beach belonging to the infamous Park's only son: Park Chanyeol.





	1. Unprepared

The knowledge that Byun Baekhyun had to marry the kid of another family in order to achieve peace between his family and said family for a feud that had been going on for three generations was widely known to everyone in Baekhyun’s large household, including Baekhyun himself. He had known for months that this was the plan set out for him, and in the beginning, he was willing to sacrifice himself for the sake of the annoying feud ending. But, at the last minute, two days before the meeting of the two families and future couple-to-be was to be held, he muttered, “Fuck this,” ditched home and left his pretentious life.

Figuring that it was never like him to bend for stupid, middle-aged traditions that were beyond ridiculous, Baekhyun didn’t want to look back. He figured that the only way he’d be able to get himself to go back home was if his family would just man the hell up and do things diplomatically rather than sacrifice a son and a life.

The moment he got out of the house, Baekhyun stood at a crossroad. He didn’t know where to go, so he ended up wandering the city of Seoul at night and checking into a high rate hotel. It wasn’t until morning that he realized that he shouldn’t use his credit cards at all if he didn’t want to be dragged back home and force to marry a stranger.

He took a train, using cash, to Kai, who lived on the other side of Seoul. Baekhyun knocked on his door wearing nothing, but the same exact clothes he left home in. Kai wasn’t in the same social circle as Baekhyun, but with Kai, working for a catering company, and with Baekhyun’s parents' frequent parties, Byun Baekhyun got to know the kid.

Initially, Kai was accepting of the fact that Baekhyun needed a place to stay, but as a week and a half passed, Kai got tired of Baekhyun lazing around, doing nothing, but breathing air. With his inconsistent paychecks, Kai didn’t know whether he could support another human being under his roof. So, with a heavy heart, Kai had to break the news of his decision concerning the situation to Baekhyun.

“Morning, Baek,” Kai greeted as Baekhyun came out of the bedroom—Kai’s bedroom, which he reluctantly gave up. “Had a nice sleep?”

Baekhyun mumbled a reply, running a hand under his shirt to rub his cold chest. His droopy eyes moved to the kitchen table. “Ramen?” he asked, groggily.

Kai nodded, smiling. “All day, every day.”

“Every day it is,” Baekhyun muttered. He yawned, rolling his shoulders to undo knots. “Why not cook other things?”

“I’m always on a tight budget, Baek. You know this,” Kai sighed, setting down the coffee mug in his hand. He leaned on the kitchen island. “Listen. We have to talk.”

Baekhyun carelessly nodded, still half asleep. He pulled out one of the chairs at the table, making a screeching noise as the chair moved. “Shoot.”

“You need to get a job,” Kai blurted. “Or at least, you need to be more independent. Maybe even go home—”

Baekhyun’s eyes snapped open. “I am not going home.”

Kai raised his brows and put a hand in front of him. “Okay, okay. Forget I said that, then. I’m just saying. I can’t support both of us.”

The twirling of the sticks in Baekhyun’s bowl of ramen stopped and a long silence was born. “Sorry.” Baekhyun looked up at Kai. “I didn’t know where else to go. Every place that popped in my head was a place that my parents knew I’d go to. You were the only one that I knew wouldn’t come to mind when they thought about where I’d gone.”

Kai shrugged. “It’s fine. But hey, listen. Just because I’m telling you to get a job—”

“—you mean ‘leave,’” Baekhyun cockily corrected, to which Kai shrugged, grinning.

“More or less of a better term,” Kai commented. “Anyways, just because I’m putting you in this situation doesn’t mean that I’ve completely forsaken you to deal with the cruel world of unemployment alone.”

“Pray tell how you’re going to pull me out of the shit hole that you dug for me,” Baekhyun said, rolling his eyes as he began to eat.

“I was catering for a party a few nights ago when I was thinking about our situation,” Kai started. He had Baekhyun’s attention, though Baekhyun pretended to be bored and uninterested. “I overheard some female maids gossiping in one corner, you know? They were talking about a this new opening at this family’s house. I’m guessing from the way they were talking that this family is kind of important—”

“—What if they were talking about my family?” Baekhyun interrupted. “Are you trying to in-avertedly send me back home, you ass?”

“No!” Kai laughed. “I swear, I’m not! Let me finish, okay?” When Baekhyun nodded hesitantly, Kai talked again. “So, with my silver platter full of high-class treats for rich, snarky bitches, I moved closer to them. They were sharing information and I just so happen to—” Kai reached in his back pocket and pulled out a ripped, crumpled up piece of paper, showing to it Baekhyun “—get the address.”

“You went up and asked the maids for information about a maid opening?” Baekhyun asked, shrilly.

“No,” Kai groaned. “I was listening in and I just memorized it.”

“You’re fucking me right now.”

“One: not interested, and two: no,” Kai smirked. “I just have good memory. It comes in handy when people are telling you fifty million things about what the hell they want at their fucking party.”

Baekhyun quirked his lips, being a bit doubtful. “Toss that to me.” Kai complied and folded the paper enough for it to be tossed without flailing around in the air.

Baekhyun unraveled the paper. When he saw the address, he snapped his eyes at Kai. “This is all the way on the fucking coast.”

“Did I forget to mention that?” Kai asked playfully.

“You really want me to be gone that badly,” Baekhyun mumbled with no hard feelings. But then he thought about it. If he was to go off and work for some family hours from where his family was, the likelihood of them finding him was minimalized to oblivion. “Kai,” he called. “In all seriousness, in terms of job description, do you think I have the technical skills of a maid?”

“As in?”

“Cooking.”

Kai glanced up. “Well, can you cook?”

“Moderately. Well enough to keep myself alive,” Baekhyun nodded, though his eyes were still on the paper.

“Uh, what about cleaning?” Kai asked.

Baekhyun put the paper down and gave him a look. “Does your apartment look like a fucking pigsty right now?”

Kai clicked his tongue and pointed a finger at Baekhyun. “Then that proves that you can clean!” he laughed.

Baekhyun put an elbow on the table and rested his chin on his hand. “What else do maids do?” he mumbled.

“They say ‘yes master’ and ‘no master,’” Kai answered.

“Not my style,” Baekhyun said before folding the paper. “Anyways, sure. I’ll check this job opening even though to the rest of the world—excluding you—‘maid’ refers to female servants, not—” Baekhyun motioned to his crotch “—males.”

“A job’s a job, Baek,” Kai tsked, picking up his coffee again and moving around the island to join Baekhyun at the table. “Might as well give it a go.”

Baekhyun scoffed, twirled his sticks, playing with his food, then said, “Sure, if they don’t mind having a maid with a dick.”

 

 

Oh, fuck my soul, Baekhyun thought as his eyes glazed over eleven women outside the address Kai had given him. As he casually made his way over to the end of what he presumed to be the “line”, Baekhyun fixed the hood of his clothes and pulled his pants up—not that his skinny jeans would allow itself to be risen up higher.

When he got to the back, a few of the women—some of which were girls—turned around to look at him. Baekhyun smiled and waved as if he had a reasonable reason for being there other than to apply for the same job that they were there for. He took a gander at what they were wearing: heels, skirts, a nice top, and so on. Then, Baekhyun looked at what he was wearing, which were Kai’s not-so-in style clothing. The only thing he wore that was his was the jeans. No one would’ve been able to guess his family’s background the way he looked right then and there.

The line, as Baekhyun found, did not take long to deteriorate. The women would go in and spend about five to ten minutes inside the house before they came out. Most of them came out looking upset and dissatisfied. It made the rest of the line worried. Apparently, Baekhyun had come very late so he was the last one to do with no one else behind him.

When he went inside the house, the first thing he noticed was the view of the sandy beach and ocean. God…Why doesn’t my family own shit like this…Baekhyun frowned the rest of the way as he was being led to a room. As he entered the room, the nice feeling he got from the ocean view dissipated as he was confronted by a woman, who he thought looked like a cross examiner.

“Sit,” the woman ordered behind her glasses. Baekhyun froze for a second at her coldness, but recovered quickly, garnering the energy to smile at the bitch before sitting down on the only other chair in the room. The woman then held out her hand and Baekhyun didn’t understand what she was asking for. He figured that she wanted to shake his hand, but when he reached over to shake, the woman pulled her hand away. “Not your hand! Your resume!”

“Resume?”

The woman stared at him, then took off her glasses. “Do you mean to tell me that you don’t have a resume with your previous works and employment written down along with names and phone numbers for recommendations for this job?” she asked, rather disbelievingly.

Baekhyun wasn’t entirely intimidated. He was used to people like this, but he’d be lying if he didn’t admit that he hated people like her. Pretentious. “Uh, no.”

The woman gave him a look. “Do you know what this job is for or did you just stumble on here? We’re not running a gym, which is what you are dressed for. We’re a household looking for a maid, not a fitness trainer.”

I look like a fitness... What? “And I am here looking for a job, which is being your so-called ‘maid,’” Baekhyun said, lifting a hand. “I’m not at the wrong place, unless my friend heard wrong, which I doubt he did. I don’t have a resume, no, but I do know a thing or two about maids.”

“I’m sure a hormonal, young man like you would,” the woman scoffed. “Do you have any skills? Cause you look like you don’t.”

“Ouch,” Baekhyun said, faking a hurting look. His attitude in this entire interview was completely slacking. Was he even trying? “As a matter of fact, I can cook and clean.”

“Anything else?”

It was Baekhyun’s turn to scoff. “What else do maids do? I’m healthy. I breathe. I’m alive. I can even be a good companion if an old woman like yourself want someone to watch your daily morning shows with you as you’re eating your oatmeal.”

The woman’s face was blank and un-amused. “I see…” She waved a finger in the air. “You’re very sarcastic. You don’t even care that I’m a potential employer.”

“I care,” Baekhyun corrected. “I’m just unrelenting.”

“I can sense that.” The woman sighed and put her glasses back on. “Well, that is all.”

Baekhyun grinned, nodding as he got off his chair. “That was quick. It’s been nice. I’ll be seeing you never,” he said, cocking his head as he turned for a door.

Just before he reached for the doorknob, he heard the woman behind him say, “You better not mean that. I better see your sarcastic face back here in the evening with all your belongings. All servants stay in the house. You will be fed, but you will not be required to wear a uniform because your job is a little out of the case.”

Baekhyun whipped around. “Lady, did you just hire me after that insultingly stupid interview?”

The woman shrugged. “You are a male—”

“—Yes, I am.” Baekhyun motioned at his lower half.

“Therefore you can’t get pregnant,” the woman added.

“Nope.”

“And the likelihood of you falling in love with the Park’s son is less than those of the women who came before you.”

Baekhyun smirked. “Why, thank you. I’ll try not to fall in love with said boy,” he said, pretending to tip a hat. “I’ll be back, lady. Of course, I won’t have anything with me. I’m kind of homeless right now.”

The woman’s jaw dropped. “Homeless?”

“Yeah. No clothes or anything.”

The woman groaned and rubbed her temple. “Fine. Fine. Come back after doing what you need to do. Then, one of the other servants will take you to buy some clothes appropriate for this house.”

Baekhyun bit his tongue, about to tell her about his well-stable financial situation, but figured he’d tell the person he’d be shopping with that he can pay for everything on his own. “Okay.” Before he left, he had to ask, “So where will my room be?”

“Across his room.”

“Who’s ‘his’?”

“Mr. Park Chanyeol, who is now your main priority.”


	2. I.D

The house itself had seven bedrooms, but as Baekhyun later found out, only four were occupied. He expected a handful of servants at the helm, but as he saw, the only people working at the house was the cook, the landscaper, Park Chanyeol, and himself.

Kyungsoo was the cook. He had beautiful eyes and a slender body with looks that could tug a man’s heart out. Even Baekhyun had to admit that if Kyungsoo wasn’t so motherly, he’d actually fall for him himself. Sehun was the landscaper, though “flower boy” would’ve been a better job title since all he practically did was snip the hedges and water plants.

As it turned out, the woman who did the interview did not live at the house itself. She, apparently, was Park Chanyeol’s grandmother—a very protective one at that, Baekhyun thought. He almost felt embarrassed for his interview. Almost. Adding to the ongoing revelation of things, Baekhyun found out that Park Chanyeol was the only Park living in the house. So, really, Baekhyun was a personal maid rather than a family maid.

Three days passed before the three of them—Kyungsoo, Sehun, and Baekhyun—got busy cleaning and dusting the house extra well. Kyungsoo had gotten word that Park Chanyeol was making a return to his house, which Baekhyun thought was a bummer because he really liked casually getting to know the other two people. But then he shrugged, realizing that one day his newfound employer would have to come home someday from god knows where.

Of all the times to come home, the bastard decided to come home at one in the morning. Baekhyun, of course, was sleeping, and despite Sehun urging him to wake up to greet the guy, Baekhyun—already too comfortable with Sehun—slapped the hand away and told him to come back at some other time. Sehun tried his best to wake him up, but gave up when he knew that his efforts were futile.

When morning came, Baekhyun got up because he knew he had to. He opened his closet full of clothes bought with the last bit of cash he had on him back when he was taken out to shop with Kyungsoo. Not thinking too much of it since there wasn’t a uniform, he put on a thin, white shirt under a gray cardigan and slipped on a pair of perfectly fit jeans. He went on to brush his teeth and even took his time brushing his hair. By the time Baekhyun looked at clock, it was already nine-thirty. He shrugged. At the moment, he didn’t care if Mr. Park thought that waking up at this hour was unacceptable. Not my prob—Baekhyun stopped when he realized that it was his problem.

Baekhyun opened the door of his room, took a few steps across the hall, and burst into what he knew was Park Chanyeol’s room. His eyes glazed over the room and eventually made their way to the bed where a sleeping figure was sleeping under the covers, face flat on the pillow, stomach facing down. Baekhyun puffed his cheeks with air before exhaling, exhausted with his job already now that it actually started. He moved to the foot of the bed and placed his hands on it. Then, he began to shake the bed with everything he had.

“Wake up, wake up, wake up, wake up!” he loudly sang. He heard silence and shook harder. “Yah! Time to wake up and do things!” When Baekhyun heard a small groan, he smirked. “Wake up and smell the grass.”

When Baekhyun resorted to whistling, his attendee finally had enough. Though muffled, Baekhyun could hear Park Chanyeol’s angry, deep voice. “I get it! Fuck!”

Smirking, Baekhyun took his hands off the bed and leaned back. “Then let’s get going! Kyungsoo made some bitchin’ breakfast in the kitchen, which—might I say—looked amazing—”

Chanyeol scowled into his pillow before rolling on his side to take a gander at who the hell was waking him up. When he saw a perfectly handsome guy standing over his bed, he was almost at a loss for words. He didn’t let Baekhyun’s appearance distract him too much. Chanyeol went back to frowning disapprovingly at the guy. “Who the fuck are you?”

Baekhyun glanced up at the ceiling before meeting Chanyeol’s eyes. He didn’t forget to note that through his peripheral vision, he could see that Chanyeol wore no shirt to bed. Classy, Baekhyun thought. “Well, I’m your new maid.”

“You’re a guy.”

Using both hands, Baekhyun showcased his lower half. “Yes.”

“And you’re a maid…”

“A job’s a job,” Baekhyun said, imitating Kai’s answer.

Chanyeol stared at Baekhyun for the longest time. His eyes often shifted to Baekhyun’s smirk before scanning the guy’s body. “Why aren’t you wearing the uniform?”

Baekhyun looked down and pinched at his clothes here and there before looking back at the shirtless Chanyeol. “I was told there wasn’t a uniform,” he said brightly. “I wouldn’t have worn it, anyways.”

Groaning, Chanyeol threw his head back on his pillow and closed his eyes. “What kind of unorthodox maid are you?” Beyond Chanyeol's sight, Baekhyun heaved his shoulders. Chanyeol sighed. “Never mind. Anyways, come over here and do your job.”

Baekhyun yawned and rubbed his eyes. “I thought that waking your royal highness up was my job,” he laughed. “My morning job, at least.”

Chanyeol snorted and sat up. “Not even. Since you’re a guy, you probably won’t have any problems with this.” Chanyeol paused for a second before moving the cover off his body. It was then that Baekhyun realized that not only was Chanyeol shirtless, but the pretentious fuck was naked all the way down to his toes. “Help me with my problem.”

Baekhyun’s eyes moved to Chanyeol’s member, not amused. Then, they darted back at its owner; the smirk on Baekhyun’s lips was gone and his lips were pursed. He leaned, grabbed the covers and aggressively threw it back on Chanyeol’s body. “Impressive, but how about no.”

If Chanyeol was groggy with sleep before, he wasn’t anymore. He glanced at the sudden stern look on Baekhyun’s face. “But you’re the maid,” he said, innocently.

Baekhyun raised a brow. “I don’t recall jacking you off as one of the things that I had to do.”

“But all the others before you accepted.”

“Good for them,” Baekhyun said. “But I’m not.”

The two stared at each other for a few moments before Chanyeol broke out a grin. “Congratulations. You’re not fired for trying to touch me.”

Baekhyun blinked for a second before forming a sarcastic smile on his face. “Wonderful.”

The grin on Chanyeol’s face remained. “What’s your name?”

“Byu—” Baekhyun halted himself. His last name was really well-known. Baekhyun decided to leave out his last name. “Baekhyun.”

Chanyeol nodded. “You already know who I am.”

No shit, Baekhyun wanted to say, but then he remembered he worked for this guy now. He smiled. “Of course, I do.” He scoffed before turning. “Get dressed, you nudist. Like I said, Kyungsoo made breakfast. You can eat alone. I think I just lost my appetite thanks to you.”

As Baekhyun walked to exit the room, Chanyeol called out, “Let’s see how long you’ll last, Baekhyun.”

Baekhyun put a hand in the air, indicating that he didn’t care much. “Wasn’t even planning on staying, Chanyeol,” he muttered under his breath.

 

 

“I swear, you look familiar, Baekhyun,” Chanyeol said as he finished the last bit of coffee in his cup. He glanced back up at Baekhyun, who was washing the pots that Kyungsoo had used. The guy looked like he was from an old photograph Chanyeol had seen somewhere...

Baekhyun didn’t appear to be affected by the words. “Impossible. I’m perfection. There’s no one else like me,” he said.

Chanyeol rolled his eyes. “Whatever.” Then he turned his attention to Kyungsoo, who was beside Baekhyun, putting the dishes on the rack. “Kyungsoo. Any word from the old woman?”

Kyungsoo finished putting the last of the dishes where they belonged. “Uh, let’s see—oh! Your grandmother called this morning when you were still sleeping.”

“And?”

“She asked to meet you in town by eleven,” Kyungsoo informed. He wiped his wet hands on a hand towel. “She also wanted you to bring Baekhyun along.”

Baekhyun groaned. Kyungsoo and Chanyeol’s eyes snapped to him. Baekhyun noticed and waved a hand. “Excuse my enthusiasm.” The two then silently went back to talking between them, leaving Baekhyun to leave the room to join Sehun, who was outside sitting on a chair, lazily hosing plants with water.

When he was gone, Kyungsoo went around to the table where Chanyeol was sitting. “How was the meeting?”

Chanyeol rolled his eyes, scoffing sarcastically. “Just awesome. Turns out their kid ‘ran away’. Wouldn’t be surprised if this is just a damn cover up because they didn’t wanna put their part of the deal in,” Chanyeol said, biting his lips.

“Did your parents pull out of the truce?”

Chanyeol shook his head. “They were going to. I thought that this bump in the road would break me away from this entire thing, but then that stupid family convinced them that they’d get their kid back. Like hell, how the hell are they going to find her?”

“I’m sure she’ll go back home sooner or later,” Kyungsoo reassured.

“I’d rather she didn’t so this contract will bend and sway my way,” Chanyeol grumbled. Then he sighed and pushed his chair back, standing up. “I’ll just have to wait and see. Once they find this girl and I meet her, I’ll find a way to break this stupid arrangement.”

Kyungsoo smiled up at Chanyeol. “Which shouldn’t be too hard since she actually ran away to get away from all of this.”

“True.” Chanyeol pushed his empty mug at Kyungsoo. “Thanks for breakfast as always, Kyungsoo. I should go get dressed for that old woman.” He looked at the cup and tapped the table with his index finger. “Call that new maid—Baekhyun – and have him wash that since it’s his job. Then tell him to get dressed.”

“Will do,” Kyungsoo said, playfully saluting Chanyeol, who gave him a smirk in return. As Chanyeol shuffled his way out the kitchen and returned to his room, Kyungsoo rose from the table and opened the door to the deck where Baekhyun was watching Sehun do his thing. When he opened the barrier, he became aware of Baekhyun’s voice.

“Yah! You missed a spot!” Baekhyun said loudly, directing the message to Sehun.

Sehun turned his head up at Baekhyun as he turned the water off. “It’s practically all sand back here! I can’t water everything too much or else it’ll get too mushy.”

“The plants look like they’re withering, though,” Baekhyun commented, leaning on deck’s rail. “Come on, Sehun. Be more observant. Do your job,” he said, laughing.

“Yah, you just got here,” Sehun retorted. “You shouldn’t tell me how to do anything.” The look on Sehun’s face made him look like a pouting pup. “Besides, if you just looked behind you, you’d see that Kyungsoo’s waiting for you to notice he’s there. Who’s the one that needs to be more observant here?” He flashed a dominant grin to Baekhyun before turning his head and pivoting to the shed beside the house. “Later.”

Baekhyun replied with a “Hmph,” and turned around. Not to anyone’s surprise, Kyungsoo was there. Like always, he had a smile on his face. “Hey. What’s up?”

“Chanyeol needs you to get dressed to meet his grandmother in town right now,” Kyungsoo informed him.

Baekhyun almost rolled his eyes, but stopped himself. “Alright, then.”

“Oh!” Kyungsoo went back inside the house and came back out with the mug. “Before I forget, he also wanted you to clean this.”

Baekhyun took a look at the mug. He didn’t wanna wash a mug. He didn’t like working for other people. But, he signed up for this. He stepped forward and took the mug from Kyungsoo. “Sure thing,” he said. He thought he sounded too annoyed and felt bad that he was directing that at Kyungsoo, so Baekhyun ended up smiling. “Thanks again,” he said as he made his way back into the house.

Kyungsoo turned and watched Baekhyun enter the house. Then he turned back to face the ocean and was only interrupted by Sehun, who came back from the shed. “So they’ll be leaving?”

“Yeah…” Kyungsoo glanced at Sehun. “When they leave, wanna just go over there again?” Kyungsoo asked, nodding his head off to the shore. “I mean, if you’re done watering your plants.”

Sehun laughed, but nodded. “They’ll survive.”

Kyungsoo smiled and turned back to enter the house. “I’ll just see them off, then.”

“I’ll get the buckets,” Sehun said.

“Get a shovel, too,” Kyungsoo called before he slowly began to close the sliding door.

“It’s a done deal,” Sehun said, just in time before Kyungsoo completely shut the glass door.

 

 

By “dressed”, Chanyeol expected Baekhyun to change into something more formal than his shirt and cardigan, but when he came out of his room, his new maid was still dressed in the same thing that he wore that morning.

When Baekhyun saw Chanyeol coming from the hallway, he rose from the couch. “You look like you’re ready to meet your grandmother. Look at you in that cuffed shirt,” he said before pausing. “You look good.” Baekhyun smirked and Chanyeol couldn’t tell if the “compliment” was mocking him or if it really was a compliment.

Chanyeol decided not to address what Baekhyun said. Instead, he turned the focus on Baekhyun himself. “I thought I told you to get dressed, Baekhyun. You just started working here and you’re already not following the code.”

“What code are you talking about?” Baekhyun asked, folding his arms. “Cause I didn’t get the maid manual with this code explained inside.”

Chanyeol sighed exasperatedly. “It’s called the listen-to-what-I-say-and-do-it code.”

“Unheard of,” Baekhyun argued jokingly.

“Okay, I’m not going to argue with you on this. When I tell you to do something, just do it, please,” Chanyeol said, rubbing his temple. “Especially when it comes to my grandma. I know that you’re new and everything, but come on, now. You were interrogated by her to get this job, weren’t you? Cause then, you’d know what kind of person she is.”

“Yeah, but your grandmother ended up hiring me, so the only thing that tells me is that she—” is bitching grandmother “—has her head in the right place,” Baekhyun said. He looked at the clock. “What time are we supposed to get there?”

“We’re supposed to be there in tw—fuck. Ten minutes.” Chanyeol turned to Baekhyun. “I really wish you changed into something less flimsy.”

“T-shirts and cardigans say I’m casual,” Baekhyun said, grinning.

“Really? It says ‘I’m casual because I don’t care’ to me.” Chanyeol reached into his pocket and took out his car keys. “Never mind this. Let’s go.”

Baekhyun put his hands in his pocket and slumped his shoulders. “Lead the way, Mr. Park,” he said, clicking his tongue as he walked behind Chanyeol.

 

 

Baekhyun expected to be meeting the hag that Chanyeol called his “grandmother” at a place where fancy people reigned, but as it turned out, she chose to meet a small, but pricey café. They sat a table meant for two. Baekhyun, without asking for permission, grabbed one of the chairs from a nearby table and moved it to theirs. Chanyeol gave him a look, which Baekhyun met, took, and ignored. 

Chanyeol’s grandmother ordered tea and, being in the presence of his grandma, Chanyeol ordered tea also. Baekhyun gave Chanyeol a glance when he did this, obviously losing respect for his employer. Baekhyun, on the other hand, ordered a can of Sprite and a slice of cheesecake.

It was then Chanyeol’s turn to look at his new maid with a judging look. “Are you serious? Soda and cheesecake?”

Baekhyun shrugged. “I’m just trying to be casual,” he said, grinning. “Tea makes me stiff.” He looked at Chanyeol’s grandmother. “As in, uptight stiff.”

Chanyeol’s grandmother scoffed. “I see you’re the same as the last time I saw you.”

“In fact, never been better,” Baekhyun said. The clinking and clanking behind them from the kitchen brought a thought in Baekhyun’s head. “I should go wash my hands before the waiter comes back.” He stood from his seat, which screeched. “Try not to miss me too much.”

Chanyeol and his grandmother watched as Baekhyun swayed his way over to the counter and asked politely if he could use the restroom. The politeness radiating off of him as he talked to the guy over the counter made the two scoff simultaneously. When Baekhyun was gone, Chanyeol’s attention went to his grandmother.

“Why did you hire him?” he sighed.

She raised her brows. “Why not? Don’t you find him amusing?”

“Hn.”

Setting her hands on the table, his grandmother asked, “I hired him because he seemed…different. Also, I felt a little sense of déjà vu when I saw him.”

“And why is that?” Chanyeol asked, leaning back in his chair.

“Couldn’t place my finger on it,” she admitted. “But anyways, I wanted you to bring him again so I could see something for myself.”

Chanyeol creased his brows. “See what?”

“I ordered the mandatory background check on him for safety reasons,” she said as she reached into her purse and pulled out a thin file. “I figured he’d have some sort of background with a few misdemeanors. He seems like he’s that type of boy. But, when the report came back in, I found that he had no criminal records—misdemeanor or not—but I did find something extremely interesting.”

She opened the folder and pulled out Baekhyun’s profile. “When he told me his name, he told me ‘Baekhyun’. I thought he was saying that his last name was Baek and his first name was Hyun. Understandable?” Chanyeol nodded. “When the report came back—Here. Take a look at that,” she said, pointing her finger at the other name besides the name Baekhyun had given the both of them. It was in bold, right above Baekhyun's photo.

“Byun…” It came out of Chanyeol like a whisper. “As in—”

His grandmother nodded. “As in the family that you and your parents met with days ago.”

Chanyeol scowled. “What the hell? Is this some sort of plot against our family? My parents’ company? Is he going to kill me in order to get his sister out of this stupid marriage?”

Chanyeol’s grandmother blinked. “Chanyeol, Baekhyun has no sister. He’s—” She halted when Baekhyun came out of the restroom, making his way back. She calmly, yet hurriedly put the papers back in the folder and placed it back in her bag. “He’s the only child of the Byun family,” she whispered before Baekhyun was within earshot.

Before Chanyeol could reply, Baekhyun plopped back in his seat. “You’d think that by now a few drinks and a cheesecake slice would be here, right?” he said, flashing a smile. “I—oh, never mind. I take it back,” he said, laughing as he saw the waiter make his way with drinks on one platter and a plate with Baekhyun’s desired cheesecake.

Cheesecake was easily one of Baekhyun’s favorite things to eat, which explained his escape from reality when he took the first bite. It was about thirty seconds into his cheesecake delve that Baekhyun glanced up to find his other two companions watching him.

Chanyeol’s grandmother blinked and looked away, taking a sip of her tea, but Chanyeol was a different case. “Quit staring. You’re embarrassing yourself,” Baekhyun said. His voice was distorted to a degree because of the fork he had in his mouth.

In response, Chanyeol only stared. Baekhyun didn’t like the heat he was under so he just went back on to eating. Chanyeol, though, was stuck in a frozen state. Chanyeol was still reeling from the revelation that the guy sitting next to him, the guy he had flashed that morning, the guy who applied to be the maid at his house, was the same guy Chanyeol's parents arranged for him to marry, and the same guy who ran away because he didn’t want to marry him.


	3. Defiance

The drive on the way home was silent, but Chanyeol figured that the tension he felt was one-sided on his part. Baekhyun didn’t seem like he felt this silent tension. He was humming and drumming his fingers on the window. Chanyeol didn’t mind so much of his vicarious and unorthodox new worker until he decided to play his feet up on the dashboard.

Chanyeol used a hand to forcibly take Baekhyun’s legs off the surface. “Never put your feet anywhere inside this car other than the floor.”

Baekhyun was about to snap that Chanyeol was a nobody and that he didn’t take orders, but then he remembered—again—that he had a job. He cocked his head to his employer and smiled, though Chanyeol knew that this smile was fake as fuck. “Of course.”

Deciding not to comment on Baekhyun’s tone, Chanyeol changed the subject. “Since you’re new and since you weren’t fired this morning for trying to touch me, we might as well get to know each other.”

Baekhyun glanced up, pretending to think about it. “How about no.”

“How about you start talking or else I’ll kick you out right here in this god forsaken flat land and make you walk all the way back to the house?”

There were no bullets to that threat and Baekhyun knew it. Nevertheless, he rolled with the punch that Chanyeol threw his way. His fingers slipped and found the door lock, unlocking it. “Okay.”

At the sound of the click, Chanyeol’s head snapped to Baekhyun’s side just in time to see Baekhyun in the midst of pushing the car door open. Instinctively, Chanyeol stepped on the brakes. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing!?”

Baekhyun shrugged. “Walking back to the house, Mr. Park.”

Chanyeol eyed Byun Baekhyun. “I wasn’t being serious.”

Baekhyun bobbled his head before pushing the door open, taking advantage of the car not being in motion. “I’ll just follow the shore line. I’ll get there eventually.” Baekhyun shut the door before Chanyeol could speak and began to walk.

Inside the car, Chanyeol watched his maid defiantly walk with his hands in his pockets. “Did they do the right background check?” he mumbled to himself. Cause this guy doesn’t seem like he belongs to a family like the Byuns. Then Chanyeol thought. But then again, his attitude is arrogant—typical. Sighing, Chanyeol put the car in motion, slowly moving next to Baekhyun. Then he rolled the window down. “Yah! Get back in the car!”

“Can’t,” Baekhyun replied, keeping his head looking forward. “You’re gonna make me talk about myself.”

“What’s so bad about that?” Chanyeol was trying to figure out how to drive, while trying to talk to Baekhyun with his head turn to the side. He didn’t wanna run over the guy’s foot. How would Baekhyun work? Or worse yet, how would he explain it to his grandmother if she ever decided to visit how he ran over Byun’s foot?

“Oh, I don’t know,” Baekhyun said. “First it’ll start off with what kind of pets I had when I was younger. Then it’d move on to my family and then my friends. Afterwards, you’ll end up having me write down when all my sexual activities happened—”

“Stop, stop, stop—” Chanyeol stopped the car and, out of effect, Baekhyun momentarily stopped. Opening his door, Chanyeol stepped out. “Get back in the car.”

When Baekhyun saw this, he contemplated running for the hell of it and seeing what Chanyeol would do, but he figured that Chanyeol would probably get fed up with his shit, take the car, and just run him over. “Not gonna force me to tell you anything, right, Mr. Park?”

“Quit calling me ‘Mr. Park’,” Chanyeol said as he approached Baekhyun. He took him by the arm and began to move him towards the passenger side. Baekhyun didn’t struggle, which Chanyeol was silently thankful for since he predicted otherwise. “And I won’t make you tell me anything now, but sometime later on, we have to get to know each other on a deeper level.”

Baekhyun was bursting out laughing as Chanyeol put him back in his seat. When Chanyeol joined him back inside the car, Baekhyun turned to him, wiping a tear. “Deeper level? You sound really sentimental!” Baekhyun chuckled, putting on his seatbelt again. “I’m just a maid, Chanyeol. I might even be gone tomorrow. Who knows.”

Chanyeol scoffed. “No you won’t. As far as I know, you were homeless before you came to apply for the job.” Inside, Chanyeol wanted to spit out the word “homeless” seeing as how Byun Baekhyun was fifty billion miles away from the real meaning of that word. “You need this job and you will be staying. You won’t be leaving any time soon.”

“I wasn’t aware that I signed up for slave work and gave up all my rights to leave,” Baekhyun replied, raising an amused brow.

Chanyeol just rolled his eyes and began to put the car in motion once again. As the car cruised, he began, “Let’s start off with something simple—”

“—I thought that you weren’t going to make me tell you anything,” Baekhyun cut in.

“But it’s not a hard question.”

Baekhyun thought about it and grinned. “Okay. Shoot.”

“What’s your full name—”

“—Never mind,” Baekhyun said. “I’m tired.” He reached beside the seat, pulled a lever, and declined his seat. “I’m just gonna close my eyes and pretend you’re not there because technically, since we’re not at the house, I’m not on the job and I don’t have to listen to you.”

Chanyeol glanced down at Baekhyun, frowning. He didn’t know what else to do, knowing that he’d never get anywhere with the conversation then. Baekhyun’s refusal to answer made it bluntly obvious who he was and that everything Chanyeol's grandmother told him was true. This sarcastic bitch was really his fiancé.

 

 

When they arrived at the house, it was empty. Baekhyun pushed past Chanyeol as Chanyeol was trying to pull the key out from the door. Chanyeol didn’t appreciate the brash move, but he didn’t say anything about it. He’d teach his maid slash fiancé a thing or two later.

As Baekhyun walked around the open living space, Chanyeol put his keys on a nearby table. “Kyungsoo?” he called. “Kyungsoo!” He got no response. “Sehun!” Sehun didn’t respond either.

While Chanyeol decided to go on the “calling” route, Baekhyun used his eyes to try and see where the two were. He walked over to the glass door leading to the deck and opened it. He knew that Chanyeol was watching him, but his attention wasn’t fully caught by his new employer. It was caught by the two figures in the distance on the beach and the faint voices coming from them.

Immediately when he saw them, Baekhyun grinned as he knew what they were doing. He went back inside the house and headed toward the hallway to go to his room. He passed by Chanyeol—again—who was standing with his arms folded.

“What’re you doing?” Chanyeol asked. His eyes went back to the glass door and the deck that led to the private beach. He wretched his eyes away and followed Baekhyun down the hall. “Did you find Kyungsoo and Sehun?” Baekhyun didn’t answer. He took a sharp turn into his room and before Chanyeol could catch up and enter, too, Baekhyun shut the door in his face. Annoyed that his fiancé—or more appropriately at the moment, his maid—was acting defiantly, Chanyeol pounded on the door once. “Hey! Baekhyun! As your employer, you better quit acting like this!”

Behind the door, Chanyeol heard rustling going on and the sound of Baekhyun’s footsteps stomping around for a minute. What the hell is he doing? Chanyeol scrunched a brow and gave the door a hit again. “Yah! Baekhyun! Maid!” Chanyeol huffed. “You better—”

Suddenly, the door swung open and Chanyeol saw that Baekhyun put some change into his wardrobe. He still wore the white shirt, but the cardigan was discarded and so were his pants, which was replaced by the swim trunks he wore instead.

“What’re you dressed up like that for?” Chanyeol inquired. “Are you seriously going to the beach right now!?”

Baekhyun smirked and nodded. “It’s a nice day. Kyungsoo and Sehun are making a gigantic sand fortress. You keep trying to make a slave out of me. I’m going to take an hour off. Okay?” Everything he just said sounded like a sharp “here’s what I’m going to do” list to Chanyeol’s ears.

When Baekhyun tried to get past Chanyeol again, Chanyeol stopped him by putting his arm out. “You work for me, yet you’re sarcastic, defiant, and constantly disrespecting me and my grandmother.”

“Ding, ding, ding ?” Baekhyun questioningly said, grinning.

Chanyeol scoffed, unimpressed. “And you expect me to reward you with an hour off?”

Baekhyun hummed and clicked his tongue. “I wasn’t exactly asking. I just kind of told you that I was.”

Chanyeol gave him a look. “How the hell were you raised?” he asked, incredulously. “Why the hell do you have this attitude about you?”

Baekhyun smirked, shrugging. “I was born this way.” He took Chanyeol’s arm and tried to take it down. When he couldn’t, he simply ducked under it. “I’ll be back on the job an hour from now! Promise!”

Chanyeol stared at the walking figure for a second before going after him, pulling the collar of his shirt open. It felt constricting. “Baekhyun! I did not give your sarcastic little ass permission to go outside!”

Baekhyun whipped around, facing Chanyeol. “But Kyungsoo and Sehun are out there, Chanyeol. Are you trying to play favorites?”

Chanyeol shook his head. “I don’t need to play favorites, Baekhyun. They work and they do their jobs. They’ve been doing that for some time now so they have my permission to do as they want when they have the time. You, for one, are new and you’re way too damn comfortable at this house already.”

Baekhyun blinked. The grin turned into a smile. “Isn’t there a saying that says ‘make yourself feel at home’?”

Chanyeol sighed. “Not too much like home.”

Baekhyun paused. “You’re right. Not too much like home.” Then he turned around and headed towards the backdoor again. “Because if this place was like home, Chanyeol, I’d probably leave my resignation on the table and leave in the middle of the night.” The tone sounded serious, but then Baekhyun played it off with a laugh. “I wasn’t kidding about the hour, though. I made the beds already, and there’s no dishes left unwashed. Let’s carry this on later, okay?”

With that, Baekhyun left the house through the back and left Chanyeol to watch him as he half jogged and half ran his happy way to where Sehun and Kyungsoo were. Chanyeol rolled his eyes, but sighed. If this was the person he had to marry, how the hell was he going to stay alive with such an annoying and bitchy person living in the same house as him? He’d go crazy! Chanyeol wasn’t used to people trying to up-do him, so whenever Baekhyun went up against him, he was rubbed the wrong way.

Chanyeol cursed as he went, heading for his own room. This was not how he imagined things to turn out. There were still many questions flying in his head. Why was Baekhyun really there? Did Baekhyun know him? Chanyeol decided to get the answers to those questions later. He went inside his room and changed.

 

 

“Hey!” Baekhyun called once he got near enough. He stopped jogging and began to stalk with his usual swagger over to Kyungsoo and Sehun. “Nice castle,” he said, smiling.

“Thanks,” Kyungsoo said, smiling back. He looked at Sehun. “Sehun did most of the work.”

“Is this what you guys do on your free time?” Baekhyun laughed.

“Might as well,” Sehun replied. “We don’t usually do our job all day, you know. With only the four of us living there, it’s not really too much trouble.”

“Really? I thought you watered plants all day,” Baekhyun joked.

“Oh, shut up and get on your knees. Help us,” Sehun mumbled. Despite his lowly voice, he had a smile hidden as he dropped his face.

“On my knees?” Baekhyun grinned. “Okay.”

Baekhyun got on the ground and was ordered by Sehun to add to the base of their structure. He ordered Kyungsoo to design the hell out of their precious work as Sehun, himself, got up, took the shovel and got some more sand, piling it beside them just in case they needed more.

Ten minutes passed and Sehun was still piling when he looked up and saw Park Chanyeol making his way over to them with his hair blowing in the soft, ocean breeze. “Hey,” Sehun mumbled, tapping Kyungsoo’s side with his foot. “Chanyeol came out of the house. He’s coming over here.”

“What? Really?” Kyungsoo stopped working to look.

Baekhyun was the only one who was still working his hands. “Oooh, breaking news. Park Chanyeol gets some fresh air,” he mocked, laughing. “I don’t understand. Why are you two so shocked?”

Kyungsoo quirked his lips before he went back to creating tiny windows and designs on the sand. “In all the times Sehun and I have done this, he just watches from the window. He never actually comes out.”


	4. Red

“Go away,” Baekhyun yelled, cupping his hands when Chanyeol got nearer and nearer to where he and Kyungsoo were padding on to their castle.

Chanyeol gave his maid a scowling look, but ignored the remark. To spite him, Chanyeol kneeled down right next to Baekhyun, not giving a flying shit if Baekhyun appreciated the lack of space between them. When they were going to be married—if Chanyeol couldn’t find a way out of the situation—then proximity from each other is something that they had to deal with sooner or later.

Baekhyun looked at Chanyeol up and down, then leaned in and said, “Mr. Park, you’re too close. I consider this sexual harassment.”

Chanyeol scoffed. “This is my property. I can sit where ever I want.”

Baekhyun saw that he had a legal point and shrugged. “Alright. Well, then get working.”

Chanyeol glanced over. “You’re the one to talk. Speaking of work—”

“How about no,” Baekhyun replied, cutting the conversation at the bud. He was on a self-announced break. He didn’t want to talk about work. Luckily for him, sweet Kyungsoo came to his rescue and asked Chanyeol to help him with carving out windows.

Twenty minutes in, Kyungsoo decided that it was about time to stop. He went inside to make some lunch for him and Sehun since they didn’t have any, having spent most of the late morning and early afternoon outside. When the two left, it inevitably left Baekhyun alone with his giant employer.

A few moments after they were alone, Baekhyun turned to Chanyeol. “So, what do you do, Mr. Park?”

“I told you to stop addressing me as ‘Mr. Park’,” Chanyeol curtly said. “It’s weird considering we’re about the same age. And for your question, I do technological and business things. Something that’s probably not up your alley.”

“Like making microchips and selling them.”

Chanyeol shook his head. “Bigger things than that. More like robotics.”

“Hmm…That sounds really interesting,” Baekhyun said, nodding. His smile, though, was slanted, giving Chanyeol the impression that he was lying. There was an awkward silence between them for a minute. Then Baekhyun crossed his arms, taking hold of the bottom of his shirt, and lifting it over his head.

Chanyeol watched his maid take his shirt off—throwing that off onto the ground— and ruffle his hair afterwards, flipping it off to the side, leaving it messy. “What’re you doing?”

“I’m trying to seduce you into giving me a raise,” Baekhyun sarcastically said, tilting his head. “Actually, I’m going in the water.” Baekhyun motioned to his swim shorts. “I didn’t buy these for nothing.”

Chanyeol’s eyes dropped to the shorts. “You shouldn’t have bought them at all. The money my grandma gave you was supposed to be used for buying clothes, not swim wear.”

“I didn’t use Old Raisin’s money,” Baekhyun mindlessly mumbled as he got up. “I used my own.”

Looking up at the half-naked guy in front of him, Chanyeol raised a brow. “Don’t you have a closet full of clothes?”

Baekhyun snorted, antsy about leaving Chanyeol and the completed sand castle. “Yeah.”

“You know, the last time I checked, the shopping district in town isn’t exactly the friendliest when it comes to price.” Chanyeol gave him questioning look. “Didn’t you say you were homeless?”

Baekhyun blinked before bending forward and cocking his face right in front of Chanyeol’s. “I didn’t have a house, but I had money. Alright?”

“How much money, Baekhyun?”

Baekhyun pulled back, crossing his arms. “That’s none of your business, Park Chanyeol.”

Chanyeol tilted his head and smirked. “Any more vague answers and you might as well rename yourself ‘Shady’, Baek.”

Taking a step back, Baekhyun shrugged and threw on a smirk that mirrored Chanyeol’s. “Tell me when I become too shady so I’ll know when to leave!”

The amusement on Chanyeol’s face left. “You’re not quitting.”

Turning around and heading to the waters, Baekhyun waved a hand. “I forgot I signed up for slave work. I’ll be back on duty in an hour.”

Chanyeol creased his brows. “You said that thirty minutes ago!” he yelled after the departing—annoying, defying, sarcastic—new maid slash supposed fiancé.

Baekhyun twirled around once, giving Chanyeol a shrug and a non-serious face. “Did I?” he yelled back.

By the time Chanyeol was going to respond back, Baekhyun was already too far. Chanyeol’s voice still could’ve reached him, but Chanyeol figured that it wasn’t worth it to argue yelling.

Silently fuming, Chanyeol watched as Baekhyun laughed at himself when the cold waters spiked him wave after wave. What the hell was so amusing about being cold in sea water? Chanyeol didn’t understand.

He had only met Byun Baekhyun and he was already bulldozed over by a lot of things. First, there was the fact that this guy was the runaway bride—not groom, because Chanyeol would’ve stabbed the devil if he was the “bride” in their damn relationship. The second thing that struck him was Byun Baekhyun himself. Chanyeol admitted to himself that at least the guy had standards. At least he didn’t take him up on the order of jacking that hard on earlier that morning. But, none of that really mattered. Chanyeol was still puzzled. One minute the guy was like a child—ordering cheesecake and soda for lunch; laughing at himself every time an ocean wave hit him—then the next moment, he’d be an authoritative bitch with his vague, sarcastic, and evasive answers.

Chanyeol sighed. He honestly didn’t know Byun Baekhyun well enough yet to figure him out, but the time would come eventually.

Taking the shirt that Baekhyun had thrown to the side, Chanyeol grumbled as he got up to go sit in a semi-grassy area with not as much sand. He put the shirt on the ground before lying down, placing his head on it. Then he took his phone out of the pocket of his shorts and looked at the time. Adding thirty minutes to the current time, Chanyeol set a target hour to yell and scream at Baekhyun to get his ass back into the house.

The sun was high up in the sky and Chanyeol put his forearm over his face. Closing his eyes, Chanyeol decided to pass the time by thinking of potential punishments to do if Baekhyun decided to pull another “I’ll be back in an hour” stunt after his thirty minutes of—reluctantly given— freedom was up.

Unfortunately for Park Chanyeol, he fell asleep waiting.

 

By the time Baekhyun got out of the water, time had ticked itself on by. He honestly lost track of time and didn’t know how much of it passed when he stepped back on dry land. Dripping wet, he shook the hair off his face and moved it off to the side. As he got closer to the place where he had left Chanyeol, he noticed that his domineering employer had moved over to a grassier area. Not only that, but Baekhyun had noticed that his shirt was being put to use.

Baekhyun frowned at the sight. That shirt wasn’t on some god damn sale racket, he thought to himself as his eyes glazed over Chanyeol’s sleeping self. Scoffing, Baekhyun moved to kick the giant awake, but then he thought, “Why should I?” Shrugging, Baekhyun moved past the sleeping body and walked back to the house.

When Baekhyun walked back inside the house, he was met with Sehun and Kyungsoo watching him from the kitchen island where they sat on stools, eating their lunch.

“Where’s Chanyeol?” Kyungsoo asked.

Baekhyun smirked. “He decided to take a stroll along the water.” Moving quickly through the area, Baekhyun added, “He said he’ll be back in a few.”

Kyungsoo turned his head, watching Baekhyun go in the direction of the main hallway. “In a few?”

“Yeah,” Baekhyun confirmed with his back towards Kyungsoo. “A few.”

“A few what? Minutes?”

“Or hours,” Baekhyun mumbled to himself as he kept walking and pretended that he didn’t even hear Kyungsoo ask.

 

“Hours” was correct.

Kyungsoo was worried when Chanyeol didn’t come back inside an hour after Baekhyun did, but Baekhyun’s calm—and nonchalant—attitude about Chanyeol’s lack of presence kind of put him to ease.

It wasn’t until three hours went by that all Hell broke loose when Chanyeol walked very stiffly into the house, slamming the sliding door open. Kyungsoo and Sehun were talking in the living room so when they heard the loud noise, they immediately turned their head to the backdoor only to be left gaping at their sunburnt employer.

Before either of them could stutter out words, Chanyeol’s angry voice bellowed. “Where the fuck is Baekhyun!”

Sehun swallowed. “He’s in his room…” he replied meekly.

Chanyeol’s burning glare moved to the hallway before quickly—but rigidly—stalking down the hall. Coming up to Baekhyun’s room, Chanyeol took a fist and pounded on the door. When the door didn’t open fast enough, Chanyeol kicked the damn barrier.

“It’s not locked,” a voice sang from inside the room.

The voice sounded nice, but Chanyeol wasn’t in the mood. His hand harshly grabbed the knob, twisted it open, and then pushed the door open so hard that it hit the wall behind it. The rough entry caused Baekhyun to look up from a book he found somewhere around the house hours ago.

The sight before him was extremely comedic, but Baekhyun caught himself before he could burst out laughing. He bit his lips to stop the vocal laughter, but he couldn’t stop his face from twisting into laughable expressions, nor could he stop his eyes from glistening.

When he calmed himself enough, Baekhyun allowed himself to speak, but even then, he couldn’t speak fluidly. “W-what happened to y-you, Mr. Park?” he asked, trying his best to restrain himself.

Chanyeol’s jaw locked. “What happened? What the fuck happened!?” he yelled, not bothering to be considerate of the other two people in the house, who were probably listening in. “You fucking left me outside! In the sun! I’m fucking burnt and you’re fucking laughing like it’s the most hilarious shit in the world!”

That was it. Baekhyun didn’t try keeping himself together anymore. He just started laughing his guts out, tossing the book in his hand aside. “You’re red!” he gasped out. “You’re so red! B-but your forehead!” Tears were streaming down Baekhyun’s face. “Your forehead is totally white! Everything from your eyebrows down is red, though!”

Baekhyun was rolling on his stomach, laughing into his bed. Chanyeol glowered at the male before moving to the structure. Then, Chanyeol took a hold of Baekhyun’s upper body and rolled him on his back so that the bastard was looking up at him.

The moment when Baekhyun opened his teary eyes, Chanyeol was taken aback for a second before gaining back his angry stance. “Stop laughing!” he growled before letting go of Baekhyun. “You think this is funny!?”

Baekhyun closed his mouth into a slanted grin before slightly nodding his head. “You look weird!” he blurted out. “I thought you were handsome before, but now, I don’t know what you are!”

In any other situation, Chanyeol would’ve been somewhat flattered by the indirect compliment, but right then, he was aching because he hurt everywhere. He wasn’t in the mood to take any type of compliments—indirect or not.

Chanyeol’s lips thinned. “I don’t know what the hell I’m gonna do with you.”

Baekhyun’s laughter subsided, but the grin on his face stayed as he laid on his back, looking up at Chanyeol. “Fire me? Kick me out?”

Chanyeol frowned. Firing Baekhyun was tempting, but he knew that wasn’t an option. Baekhyun had his uses other than cleaning. Thinking about it momentarily, Chanyeol figured that if the Byun family couldn’t track down their own son, they’d be forced to back out of the marriage deal. If he kept Baekhyun in his sights, then he could keep the guy hidden until the deal fell apart on its own. Other than that reason, he still needed to find out why the guy was under his roof and whether or not he was in some sort of plot with his parents.

Clicking his tongue, Chanyeol shook his head. “No.”

“Bummer,” Baekhyun said, tilting his head.

Ignoring him, Chanyeol moved his cocked his head back in the direction of the door. “Go to the main bathroom in the hallway and get the damn cream that treats sunburns.”

Baekhyun blinked a few times, giving Chanyeol a blank look from sitting up and scooting to the side of his bed. “Okay,” he said, lightly.

“And come back!” Chanyeol barked even before Baekhyun could make it out the door.

“Don’t worry,” Baekhyun said, turning around to give Chanyeol a smirk. “I’ll get you that cream. Good luck applying it, though.”

Chanyeol snorted. “What? You think I’m gonna try and fucking fix this myself?”

Baekhyun shrugged. “Yep.”

“Then what good are you as a help?” Chanyeol retorted. “You’re coming back here and you’re gonna fucking apply it on.”

Baekhyun tilted his head and mockingly raised his brows. “But I’ll get fired if I touch your body,” he said, recounting the moment they had that morning.

Chanyeol threw a glare. “I’m not gonna fire you—”

“—I don’t know. I don’t feel comfortable touching half-naked people who could easily jump me,” Baekhyun said in a mocked lousy voice.

“Do I look like I could fucking jump you right now!?” Chanyeol angrily shouted.

Un-phased, Baekhyun laughed before turning back around to exit the room. “No, but you do look like something.”

Chanyeol heard what Baekhyun said, but decided not to comment on it, knowing that it wouldn’t do any good. Tired of standing, Chanyeol slowly let himself down on Baekhyun’s bed. He thought he was successful in doing so, but at an untimely second, he felt a pinch of pain. Chanyeol yelled, though not so much about the pain, but rather more because that he was angry about his current state.

The angry yells and the angry cursing was abruptly stopped, though, when Chanyeol’s ears picked up the sound of Baekhyun laughing all the way down the hall. No doubt, at Chanyeol's expense.


	5. House Dynamics

With fingers splayed with soothing cream, Baekhyun swiped his fingers against Chanyeol’s red face. When Baekhyun pressed too hard, Chanyeol barked at him to be gentler. Since Baekhyun knew he was back on the job, he just cocked his head at Chanyeol—who frowned in response—and very formally said, “I’m sorry.”

Chanyeol scoffed as he kept his head up to face Baekhyun. “Sorry doesn’t cut it. You left me outside and now I probably can’t move—much less work— for days.”

“You know,” Baekhyun said as he rubbed more gently against Chanyeol’s tender face, “If you had just put on sunscreen, maybe you wouldn’t have been burnt.”

Chanyeol creased his brows. “Maybe if you hadn’t left me outside—”

“—Maybe if you hadn’t gone outside—”

“Maybe you should just apply the damn cream on without talking,” Chanyeol cut in.

Baekhyun smiled down on him. “Don’t you like my voice?”

Chanyeol rolled his eyes. It wasn’t that he didn’t like Baekhyun’s voice. Hell, the guy had a nice voice, but, again, Chanyeol wasn’t in the mood to compliment. “No. I don’t,” Chanyeol lied.

Finished with Chanyeol’s face, Baekhyun pulled back away from the sitting giant on his bed for a second. “That’s too bad. I think I have a nice voice,” Baekhyun lightly defended, not taking any offense. Then he motioned his hand and clicked his tongue. “Off with the shirt. Come on.”

Chanyeol grunted, but nonetheless, tried to take the piece of clothing off. He had trouble with ridding of it and took more time than Baekhyun would’ve liked. In the end, Baekhyun helped him out, but ended up roughly pulling the shirt away, brushing it harshly against Chanyeol’s damaged skin.

“Fuck!” Chanyeol yelped. He felt like punching Baekhyun at the moment. “Gentle! How many times do I have to fucking tell you!?”

Baekhyun winced at the tone of Chanyeol’s voice for the first time, honestly feeling a bit guilty for being as rough as he was. “Sorry.”

Chanyeol glared, but relented when he saw the look on Baekhyun’s face. He didn’t know whether he felt guilty for scaring him or slightly satisfied. Either way, Chanyeol ended up glancing away to avoid looking at Baekhyun. “Whatever.” Then Chanyeol moved his limbs. “Do the arms.”

Baekhyun nodded, but then his eyes caught something. “What about your neck?”

Chanyeol raised his brows. “Are you gonna try and strangle me?”

Quickly, Baekhyun’s grin was back on his face—which, oddly, made Chanyeol feel better— and his head was tilted mockingly to the right. “Who will write my paycheck at the end of the week?”

Chanyeol mocked the grin on Baekhyun’s mouth. “You think you’re funny.”

Moving back to Chanyeol’s side and applying a new coat of cream on his arms, Baekhyun shrugged. “I might be.”

Chanyeol snorted. “When you’re done with my arms and neck, you’re free to go—wait. I didn’t mean that in a way that you could do whatever you wanted. Go clean the bathrooms or something.”

Baekhyun gave him a bland look. “Fine. I’ll scrub your nasty tiles.”

Chanyeol met Baekhyun’s eyes. “You might wanna change your attitude, Baekhyun.”

Blinking, Baekhyun mentally shot himself in the foot while keeping that static smile on his face. “I’ll happily clean your expensive tiles.”

For a moment, Chanyeol regretted asking Baekhyun to change his attitude. The fake enthusiasm in Baekhyun’s voice was cringe-worthy. Chanyeol decided he’d rather have stupid, sarcastic remarks—along with stupid facial expressions—than a creepy, plastered smile and a shrill voice that could only be featured in corny horror films.

After Baekhyun covered Chanyeol’s arms and neck, he stepped back to observe the shirtless, burnt, and red giant. “What about your legs?”

“I think I can handle it.”

“Wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself, though.”

Chanyeol rose from the bed and gave Baekhyun a sarcastic look. “If you really wanted that, you would’ve have left me out to fry,” he said as he began to walk his way over to the door.

Baekhyun’s eyes followed him before his body moved and began to walk behind Chanyeol’s stiff self. “I told you,” Baekhyun mumbled, “You should’ve put on sunscreen.”

Chanyeol wasn’t about to have the same argument again. He grabbed the door handle and swung the door open. “Go clean some bathrooms, Baekhyun.”

“Fine,” Baekhyun grumbled. As Chanyeol was walking across the large hall over to his bedroom, Baekhyun called, “Hey, can I tell you something?”

Stopping midway, Chanyeol turned his head. “What?”

“Your nipples look like pepperoni,” Baekhyun whispered before shutting his door.

Chanyeol stood there looking confused. Just as he was about to make a three-sixty turn around to Baekhyun’s door, his ears heard Baekhyun putting the locks in his room to good use.

Over the next few days, Chanyeol had the pleasure of being laughed at the moment that he woke up. Baekhyun would wake him up the usual way: by shaking his bed, and telling him to go out and smell some grass. Afterwards, when Chanyeol would refuse to move—due to the burns—Baekhyun would walk over to his side of the bed and flip the covers off of Chanyeol’s face so that the sunlight from the windows would directly fry his eyes if he didn’t move like Baekhyun wanted him to.

It seemed like every morning someone up in the heavens would hit a restart button for Baekhyun’s memory because, to Chanyeol, Baekhyun would laugh at his appearance everyday like the bastard hadn’t seen it all before. By the time the fifth day of Chanyeol’s bodily torture came around, Chanyeol was pretty sure that Baekhyun was on some sort of laughing schedule since he would always start laughing the moment the covers were flipped, and would only stop when he had kneed Chanyeol’s bed—rocking it—and turned back around to leave.

The most frustrating thing about being burnt was that moving at all and touching anything hurt a bit. Therefore, working at home sucked. In his work room, Chanyeol often found himself too preoccupied with how his body felt instead of focusing on drawing and fixing designs for prototypes. After he realized he couldn’t do anything in his condition, Chanyeol gave up trying, deciding that since it was practically his company, he could finish things when he could and wanted without any deadlines.

A week and a half went by and Chanyeol’s condition was better. His skin was back to its normal color, except that it still had a very slight shade of pink to it. During this time, he observed and put a careful eye on Baekhyun. By doing this, he learned a few things.

Baekhyun didn’t like to work. This was obvious by the way he’d give Chanyeol the stink eye after being asked to do simple tasks like turning the television off. But, even though he had a poor mental work ethic, Chanyeol would find that the bathrooms were cleaned properly, his clothes were cleaned—and even folded— and the house was never in a mess. In the end, Chanyeol had to hand it to Baekhyun.

Another thing Chanyeol learned was that Baekhyun could sing. It was when Sehun was humming to a song one evening in the living room. Apparently, it had been a song that Baekhyun recognized. He joined in and for a moment, his voice sounded very angelic to Chanyeol’s ears…But that was until Baekhyun decided to fuck things up by changing his voice midway, trying to sound like some old fart with throat issues.

When that happened, Chanyeol almost felt stupid for thinking the guy’s voice was “angelic”. He had to remind himself that his grandmother hired a freak who liked cheesecake, soda, work breaks, and laughter, but hated working and cleaning even though he was fantastic at doing so.

Chanyeol pieced together that Byun Baekhyun hated responsibilities. But to Baekhyun’s credit, Chanyeol didn’t piece that information all by himself. In fact, it was one afternoon after asking Baekhyun to wash the dishes that Baekhyun dragged his feet and moaned, “I hate responsibilities.”

Chanyeol proceeded to ask him why he took the job if he hated responsibilities so much. Baekhyun gave Chanyeol a dead-pan look before saying, “Because of responsibilities. Do you see my problem?”

After that question, Chanyeol decided that yes, he did see Baekhyun’s problem. Baekhyun’s problem was that he was weird.

It was no wonder to Baekhyun why Chanyeol kept losing maids. Kyungsoo and Sehun had told him that it was all because Chanyeol’s female maids in the past would try funny things to try and land Chanyeol after falling in supposed “love” with him. These maids were fired the moment they tried anything, apparently.

But, from Baekhyun’s experience, he thought that they all left because they all realized that scrubbing and cleaning five regularly used bathrooms and three unused ones was too much bullshit to deal with.

From Baekhyun’s point of view, Chanyeol was a slave master. All he was missing was a whip, which Baekhyun sometimes suspected was under his bed.

By the time Baekhyun had survived two weeks at the house, he felt like he figured out the house dynamics between Chanyeol, Kyungsoo, Sehun, and him.

It was through small glances and a careful eye that Baekhyun figured that Chanyeol had a bit of a gay liking for Kyungsoo, the cook. When the thought first came to mind, Baekhyun made a face to himself, thinking that it was stupid. But then Baekhyun started noticing the smiles Chanyeol would give and he’d hear that slave-driving giant’s deep voice laugh along with Kyungsoo on whatever topic they were on.

Maybe it was just a little bromance. Maybe they were just close. Or maybe, it was because of that stupid idea popping into Baekhyun’s head that Baekhyun began to see everything that Chanyeol did around Kyungsoo as “gay”—in big, bold, rainbow colored letters.

If Chanyeol blinked? Gay for Kyungsoo. If Chanyeol sighed? Gay for Kyungsoo. If Chanyeol sneezed? That sneeze was gay for Kyungsoo.

Moving on from Baekhyun’s suspicion over Chanyeol’s relationship and feelings for the house cook, there was Sehun. After asking, Baekhyun had found that Sehun was much younger than him. Baekhyun found out that Sehun was nineteen with a not-so-rich background. Working for Chanyeol was apparently providing enough money for him to send to his struggling parents since Sehun didn’t have to spend the money on housing for himself.

Baekhyun hated school—even though he graduated college with high honors—but he knew that going to college could lead to bigger opportunities, which really meant opportunities with big money. When Baekhyun asked why he was watering Chanyeol’s sparse grass and poorly organized flowers, Sehun shrugged and said that he wasn’t financially able to.

It was at that moment that Baekhyun came to another conclusion about Chanyeol. He knew Chanyeol was rich—or at least had money. He could’ve helped Sehun go to some sort of college, but no. According to Baekhyun's theory, Chanyeol refused to fund Sehun’s education because Baekhyun knew that education was the mortal enemy of dictatorship.

The conclusion came to an end with a simple statement: Chanyeol knew that if Sehun got educated and found other opportunities, no one would be left to water his plants.

It all made sense to Baekhyun. Chanyeol was a gay, slave-driving dictator, who disliked education.

 

Last, but never the least, there was Baekhyun and his own relationship with Chanyeol.

Baekhyun figured that he had worked there long enough for Chanyeol to “get his style”, which he was right about. Chanyeol never reprimanded or punished him—oddly enough since back at Baekhyun’s house, if a maid or butler talked back, they’d immediately be fired by his pretentious parents.

Even though Chanyeol bossed Baekhyun around—when in reality, he was just asking Baekhyun to do his job— Baekhyun found that he didn’t really mind so much anymore. It had become a daily thing to fix beds, change sheets, dust—though he would do this task lazily— and wake Chanyeol’s large ass up.

In terms of actual jobs that actual maids did, Baekhyun did clean every room in that house, all for one and that was Chanyeol’s precious work room. Baekhyun never questioned why that place was off limits to him—even though he had seen Sehun go in there once or twice to talk to Chanyeol about things—but Baekhyun never really cared. Chanyeol could stash however many porn videos in that room of his. It wasn’t Baekhyun’s problem to dust and clean them.

As for appearances, Baekhyun knew that Chanyeol was good looking. Even the sunburns on their first day of meeting each other didn’t take away from that fact. Sometimes Baekhyun would stare at Chanyeol, cursing his handsome genetics. Most of Baekhyun’s staring sessions would end up with Chanyeol turning his attention right back at him, and then they’d have this strange, almost awkward, eye contact. Out of natural defense, Baekhyun would scrunch his face and shake his head, leaving Chanyeol to wonder what the hell his freak-of-a-maid was doing.

Chanyeol’s body wasn’t bad, either—as Baekhyun noticed. For someone who stayed cooped up in some work office at home all day, he was well built. His had nice arms, which was something that Baekhyun gathered from rubbing that cream all over it.

Their interactions often involved arguing and back talking. There were more moments than that though. Once, Baekhyun heard Sehun humming along to a song that he often listened to back in his college years. Since it was fit to, Baekhyun jumped in and began to sing as Sehun smiled and continued to hum. After a while, Baekhyun’s eyes left Sehun’s and dragged on over to the kitchen island where Kyungsoo was preparing dinner and where Chanyeol was trying to “get some kitchen action”—according to Baekhyun’s gay-dar.

When his eyes left Sehun and moved, Baekhyun almost regretted it. He locked eyes with Chanyeol, who didn’t look back at him with annoyed eyes like he usually did. Instead, Chanyeol's eyes were calm and almost in some sort of trance with Baekhyun. Not liking the warm, emotional connection, Baekhyun scrunched his face—like he always did—and changed his voice, trying his best to sound nasty and croaky. It all worked, though. Chanyeol snapped out of that weird gaze and went back to frowning, giving Baekhyun that “what the hell are you doing” look.


	6. Rain and Radios

The skies were cloudy and the wind blew as a medium-flow of rain came pouring down. Even though the ideal weather for beach living was supposed to be sunny and hot twenty-four hours a day all week, Baekhyun liked the view of the gray ocean crashing onto shore.

Kyungsoo was chopping up vegetables for the stew that night—something perfect for weather like the one they were having—while Chanyeol was keeping him occupied with a conversation. Sehun had brought up an old radio from the basement and was tinkering with it and trying to get it to work.

When Baekhyun finished with his shower, he left his room with a loose fitting shirt and pajama pants, though it was nowhere near sleeping time. Baekhyun just liked comfortable and pajama pants were comfortable...Just like cardigans.

“Good evening,” Baekhyun greeted as he came out of the hallway, ruffling his damp hair.

“Hi, Baek,” Kyungsoo said warmly. “Dinner will be ready in a while.”

“Alright,” Baekhyun said. As he passed the dining table where Chanyeol was sitting and judging him, Baekhyun cocked his head. “What’s your issue now, Chanyeol?”

“Baek. Your wardrobe choices,” Chanyeol replied, motioning to Baekhyun’s bottoms.

“It’s nice,” Baekhyun argued, stopping in his tracks to flap his loose pajama pants. “Anyways, fun conversation, but I’m gonna go in the living room.”

Deciding not to argue since Chanyeol knew he couldn’t change Baekhyun’s nonchalant attitude, he nodded. “Fine. Turn on the television, too.”

“What channel?”

“Any news broadcasting channel’s fine.”

“Boring choice, Chanyeol,” Baekhyun commented as he walked away.

“It’s informative and educational,” Chanyeol threw back.

“Don’t talk to me about education, you college-depriving giant,” Baekhyun muttered under his breath. He hadn’t intended for Chanyeol to hear, but when Chanyeol responded, Baekhyun figured that it was because of those large ears that he had heard.

“What did you say, Baek?”

Baekhyun turned around for a second to give Chanyeol a shrug. “You must be hearing things.”

Before Chanyeol could refute, Baekhyun turned his back on an irked Chanyeol and an amused Kyungsoo. Sitting down on the couch, Baekhyun scooted next to Sehun and watched as the guy was trying to piece together the last bit of the mechanical puzzle on the old radio.

“So you’re a tinkerer?” Baekhyun asked.

“Uh, yeah…” Sehun shyly replied. “I’m kind of good with fixing things, too.”

From the back of them, Baekhyun could hear Chanyeol add to the conversation that didn’t involve him. “He’s pretty handy around here. He even helps me with my work sometimes.”

“Thanks for the info,” Baekhyun dismissively said before turning his attention back to Sehun. “What kind of work exactly?”

“Building working models of robot prototypes and things like that,” Sehun replied.

Baekhyun sighed. “Sehun, if you have a knack for things like this, you shouldn’t be watering plants for Chanyeol.”

“Actually, he mentors me when I’m done working so it’s really a give and take thing,” Sehun said.

After a second, Sehun seemed to be satisfied. He turned his head back at the dining table. “I think I got it!”

Getting up from his seat, Chanyeol smirked as he made his way over to the couch. He leaned over, casting his shadow over both Sehun and Baekhyun. Baekhyun threw his head back and looked up.

Chanyeol felt something staring at him and immediately looked down. “What?”

“Nothing.”

The response was curt and before Chanyeol knew it, Baekhyun leveled his head and leaned forward, placing his elbows on his knees, intent on watching to see if Sehun had fixed the radio up to a point where it could turn on and function.

Feeling all eyes on him—except for Kyungsoo’s—Sehun had his moment. His fingers found the turning knob that would turn the radio on if he had done everything right. But when the knob was turned and an audible click was heard, they heard nothing.

Sehun toyed with the knob to change the stations with for a moment, but nothing. The radio was dead silent. After a while of trying, Sehun slumped his shoulders and Chanyeol sighed.

“It’s alright, Sehun.”

Sehun was wordless at his failure. Baekhyun watched as a dark cloud found its way over Sehun’s head, and he frowned. Not liking the silence brought on by the failure, Baekhyun leaned over and dragged the radio across the coffee table so that it was closer to him.

Without asking for permission, Baekhyun took the tiny tools and screw drivers that Sehun was using and began to disassemble the machine, ripping bolts and pieces out. Baekhyun didn’t need to look at Sehun—not that he even could—to know that the kid was probably horrified at was happening right then.

“What are you doing!?” Sehun cried. “You’re just ripping it apart! I didn’t label the screws and bolts and where they went! It took a really long time to figure out where they belonged! Baekhyun!”

Ignoring him, Baekhyun continued to disassemble until the back of the radio was completely gone. By the time the only thing he could see were a few wires, Sehun was on the brink of frustration just by looking at all the pieces scattered on the table.

Chanyeol’s attention was caught the moment Sehun started freaking out, and he was immediately back at the seating area, looking over at what was happening. At first he was frowning over the fact that Baekhyun was making Sehun upset, but when he saw the stubborn male taking the old machine apart like an expert, he froze.

Chanyeol knew that the Baekhyun he had gotten to know those past few weeks was not the one sitting next to Sehun at the moment. The sarcastic and childish air around him was gone, and what was left was a Baekhyun who was fully focused on finding out where Sehun’s mistake was.

In other words, Byun Baekhyun was in play.

After looking around the internal components of the radio for a second, Baekhyun smirked. “Found it,” he sang. “Sehun, you connected the wrong wires…The one for surging power to the radio—the wire connected to the knob—you connected it to the other knob, the one for changing the station…”

At the realization, Sehun was silent for a second. “Oh…”

“It’s okay. Simple mistake,” Baekhyun assured. As he fixed the wiring carefully, he said, “But the simplest mistakes are sometimes the worst ones, so you have to be careful…”

As quickly as Baekhyun had disassembled the radio, he fixed it up just as fast. Given incredible memory, Baekhyun didn’t take long to put the bolts and screws back where he had torn them from. After making sure the battery was in place, Baekhyun closed the back of the radio and scooted it back in front of Sehun.

“Try it.”

Sehun glanced at him before he reached over and touched the power knob. Then he twisted it and heard a click. Not a second too soon, there was the sound of white noise coming from the radio. Sehun’s eyes brightened as he quickly reached over to the other knob and tried different stations. It took a few tries, but eventually he found a channel that actually worked.

Sehun’s jaw dropped for a moment before he turned to Baekhyun. “I…How did you…”

Baekhyun just closed his eyes and shook his head before standing up. Ignoring Sehun’s questions, which Baekhyun knew he had, Baekhyun stood up from the couch. “Do me a favor, Sehun, and turn the television on to some news channel.” Moving away from the seating area, Baekhyun said, “I’m gonna go wash my hands. That radio’s old and oily on the inside. It’s gross…”

As Baekhyun left, Sehun was still baffled. He turned to Chanyeol who was still standing behind the seat. “You saw that right?”

Chanyeol was in the same state as Sehun, but he found himself nodding. “Yeah…”

Sehun laughed a bit as he turned his attention back to the working radio. “I mean, I was freaking out, but he just…Ah, I wanna know how he did it.”

Frowning, Chanyeol nodded absent mindedly to himself. “You know what? I do, too. Let me go ask him.”

Leaving Sehun’s side, Chanyeol went off after Baekhyun who went inside the bathroom in the main hallway. Inside, Chanyeol saw Baekhyun rubbing his hands quickly, forming bubbles with the soap. He wondered how long it would take for Baekhyun to notice him there, but when Baekhyun went on to try and blow the bubbles off his hands, Chanyeol knew that Baekhyun was far too distracted to notice anything.

“Baekhyun.”

Upon hearing the low voice, Baekhyun unpuffed his air-filled cheeks and turned his head to the door. “Excuse you. I could’ve been taking a piss.”

“The door was open and you said you were just going to wash your hands,” Chanyeol retorted.

Baekhyun shrugged. “Nicely played.”

Chanyeol crossed his arms. He wasn’t there to argue with Baekhyun about common bathroom-knocking courtesy. “You know, what you did back there was impressive.”

Turning on the faucet, Baekhyun began to rinse. “I guess.”

“How’d you do it?”

Baekhyun scoffed. “It was just a radio with a few screws. A child could’ve done that.”

“Sehun’s pretty good with figuring things out and fixing them,” Chanyeol said as he leaned on the frame. “There were like thirty unlabeled screws and bolts, Baekhyun.”

Rubbing his hands together, Baekhyun said, “So?”

Chanyeol took a pause. “I underestimated your skills, Baekhyun. Now why didn’t tell me you knew a thing or two about machines?”

Turning the water off, Baekhyun flicked his hands. “It was just a radio, Chanyeol.”

“An antique, old as fuck radio, Baek,” Chanyeol pointed out, watching Baekhyun carefully. “Sehun and I even had to go to the library to figure out the mechanics in that thing.”

Baekhyun raised his brows. “Well if you had just gone to Old Raisin, maybe you wouldn’t have had to go to the library.” Wiping his hands on a nearby hand towel, he added, “I just like old things so maybe I was familiar with it. I don’t know.”

Chanyeol pressed on. “Other than your impressive show, Baek, you also have a nice memory. Didn’t think someone like you was capable of something like that.”

Baekhyun laughed. “Didn’t think? What? Did you think I was stupid?”

Chanyeol heaved a shoulder. “You haven’t really said or done anything intelligent around here. All you really do is argue with me, laze around, talk with Kyungsoo and Sehun, and sleep.”

Baekhyun opened his mouth to refute, but he realized that Chanyeol was right. But, feeling the need to at least say something, Baekhyun refuted another point. “Whatever. But as a matter of fact, I don’t even remember what Kyungsoo made last night.”

“What’s that supposed to prove?”

Baekhyun grinned as he walked closer to Chanyeol. “It’s supposed to prove that my memory isn’t all that good,” Baekhyun replied. Standing nearly chest to chest with Chanyeol, Baekhyun tilted his head up. “Can you move?”

“Baekhyun,” Chanyeol warned. “You’re being really shady again.”

Rolling his eyes, Baekhyun scoffed. “Fixing one lousy radio and I’m automatically shady.” Baekhyun tried to side step Chanyeol, but Chanyeol blocked him. “Really?”

Holding his hands in front of him, Chanyeol justified himself. “I just want answers.”

“Not everything has answers!” Baekhyun frowned up at him, frustrated. “Why do you have pepperoni nipples? No one knows! Why are you depriving children of education? No one knows!”

Chanyeol was taken aback. “What the fuck are you going on about!?”

Huffing, Baekhyun shook his head. “Can I leave this bathroom? Like, please?” he asked, trying to go in the “please sir” route.

“Baekhyun—”

“I’m hungry.”

“I’m just asking you—”

“I’m hungry.”

“Baekhyun, I just—”

“I’m hungr—”

“Then go fucking eat!” Chanyeol cried as he stepped aside and held a hand in the direction of the kitchen. “You’re so—argh! Shady! Baekhyun, you’re shady!”

Exiting the bathroom, Baekhyun smirked at Chanyeol. “I’m just good with my hands,” he said before turning his back towards Chanyeol.

Chanyeol watched as Baekhyun left him in the hallway. It took a few moments, but it was then that Chanyeol decided he needed to up his game when it came to figuring out why Baekhyun was there exactly. Chanyeol didn’t know whether Baekhyun was there by accident or because he thought he could steal company ideas and designs right under Chanyeol’s nose, but Chanyeol was determined to find out.

After their short argument, Chanyeol realized that he couldn’t pry information out of Baekhyun that easily, so he needed a medium. Something he could use to get Baekhyun off his game and bring him down on his knees for interrogation. For a job like that, Chanyeol knew exactly what to use.

Alcohol.


	7. Dough

It took a week for Chanyeol to get himself together, but once the time to interrogate Baekhyun came around, he had gotten the nerve to actually go through with the barbaric plan to drunken the guy into submission.

The cool ocean breeze filled the house since many windows were open. Sehun finished with his job and was swinging in a hammock that he took from the house and tied to two, strong trees on the property. Kyungsoo was off in his room sleeping since the nice weather and breeze lulled him to sleep with ease.

The house was unbearably quiet. As Chanyeol walked along the hall, he could hear his own footsteps marching on the dark wooden floors. With every door passed, Chanyeol took his time making his way over to Baekhyun’s room, which was oddly quiet, but Chanyeol figured that the atmosphere must’ve sedated Baekhyun’s normal, outlandish self.

When Chanyeol reached Baekhyun’s bedroom, he was about to knock, but then noticed that the door wasn’t even closed. It was slightly open so Chanyeol decided to give it a minor push instead. As the door gave way, he saw Baekhyun lying on his bed.

There was a lot for Chanyeol to take in when he opened that door. Baekhyun had decided to go “Casual Friday” despite the day being a Wednesday. He had slipped out of the outfit that he wore that morning and had gone to full on “I don’t care” mode.

Baekhyun was wearing boxers, which had the words “superstar!” written all over them. To Chanyeol, there was no doubt in his mind that Baekhyun thought of himself as a “superstar”. Oddly enough, even though Baekhyun’s bottom half was only covered by the mediocre boxers, Baekhyun was wearing a soft gray shirt accompanied by—of course—one of his cardigans.

If Chanyeol was judging Baekhyun’s fashion taste, he’d give Baekhyun a failing score. He understood the need to be comfortable, but what was the point of being fashionably correct on top, but be so god damn wrong when it came to the bottom part? Chanyeol didn’t understand.

It wasn’t just Baekhyun’s appearance at the moment that amused Chanyeol enough to raise his eyebrows at the weird guy. The fact that Baekhyun was just lying with his legs spread apart and his arms out open made Chanyeol mentally step back. The guy looked like he had given up on life. Not only was Baekhyun’s position striking, but he also had a book right on his face.

Chanyeol shook his head. Byun Baekhyun was a genius with mechanics and was gifted with great memory. Baekhyun, on the other hand, was a lazy maid with questionable choices in clothes who couldn’t even remember being told that the milk in the fridge was way past due and ended up drinking it by accident anyways.

Sighing, Chanyeol decided to knock on the wall. He didn’t know if Baekhyun was sleeping or if he was just being weird again, but knocking was a modest way of finding out. Not soon after, Chanyeol heard Baekhyun groan.

“Please don’t make me go clean anymore bathrooms,” Baekhyun whined. “Go away instead.”

Chanyeol grinned at the tired response as he walked over to the bed. Leaning down, Chanyeol swiped the book off of Baekhyun’s face only to be greeted by two dark eyes looking straight at him.

“What’re you doing?” Baekhyun mumbled.

Chanyeol was caught in Baekhyun’s gaze and had to quickly snap himself out of it. “Getting this book out of your face—what is this, by the way?” Sensing an opportunity to break eye contact, Chanyeol took it. He looked over at the book title. “‘Once a Princess’?” Chanyeol muttered.

With a bored look on his face, Baekhyun lifted a hand. “Can I have that back?”

Ignoring the request, Chanyeol kept staring at the book. “Is this a romance novel?”

“Does it concern you?”

Flipping the front cover was a mistake. On the second page was a photo of a man and a woman clinging erotically to each other in a swamp-like setting. Chanyeol pursed his lips before slowly closing the book. “This is…umm…”

“Mine,” Baekhyun finished. “It’s mine, Chanyeol.”

Chanyeol handed the book back. “Interesting choice of genre.”

Setting the book aside, Baekhyun snorted. “Whatever. What do I owe you for this visit, anyways?”

Chanyeol looked around the room and found a chair at a nearby desk. Taking it, he scooted it next to Baekhyun’s bed. The proximity between them was very close—too close for Baekhyun’s taste. Baekhyun moved and got on his elbows before eventually sitting upright.

When both of them settled in sitting positions that they were comfortable with, neither of them did anything to stop the awkward silence that followed. Baekhyun was watching Chanyeol just as Chanyeol was watching Baekhyun. Neither said a word. Both only watched and waited for the other to say something.

Then Baekhyun glanced off up at the ceiling for a second. “Chanyeol, you didn’t answer my question.”

Then Chanyeol remembered that Baekhyun had asked him a question. Mentally slapping himself for forgetting, Chanyeol tried to play it off as if he casually forgot. “Ah, yeah…I came by to ask you what you wanted to eat for dinner.”

Baekhyun gave Chanyeol a suspicious brow. “Something preferably edible…” When Chanyeol gave him a look, Baekhyun quickly defended himself. “I wasn’t sure if that was a trick question. If I had said ‘Anything is fine’ then I'd probably be eating sticks and leaves tonight.”

Chanyeol frowned. “Stop it. I was being serious,” Chanyeol said as he folded his arms and leaned back in the chair. “Tell me what you want.”

Baekhyun didn’t respond immediately. “It’s fine. I’ll just tell Kyungsoo what I want later.” Then Baekhyun yawned. “Can you leave now cause I—”

“—No,” Chanyeol interrupted. “Just tell me what you want to eat tonight, Baekhyun.”

Baekhyun paused. “I told you. I’ll go tell Kyungsoo later—”

“Kyungsoo’s not going to be here tonight, Baek,” said Chanyeol, calmly informing the confused guy in bed. “Neither is Sehun.”

Baekhyun rolled his eyes before throwing his body back on his bed. Turning his face on the pillow, he looked up at Chanyeol. “Can I not be here also?”

Chanyeol scoffed. “No.”

“Why not?”

“Because I always give them an entire evening off once a month to do whatever they need or want,” Chanyeol said. “They both go to visit family members and usually don’t come back until midnight or the morning after.” Nudging Baekhyun’s bed, Chanyeol added: “But since you’re new—plus the fact that you were homeless before you found your way here—I figured you’d stay here at the house and we could try to like each other more.”

“You wanna spend some male-to-maid bonding time...”

Chanyeol held his tongue. He didn’t want to bond. He wanted to interrogate, but hell, whatever it took to get the job done, he’d do it. “Sure,” Chanyeol said, giving Baekhyun a small smile. “Bonding time.”

Baekhyun stared at him. “Gross.” He heaved a sigh. “Don’t smile at me, please.”

Chanyeol only smiled harder, except, now, it was to annoy Baekhyun. “People love my smile.”

“Oh, is that what they tell you?” Baekhyun threw back. Unable to not laugh at his own sarcasm, Baekhyun turned his head back to the pillow momentarily, laughing to himself for a while.

Chanyeol glowered, but then softened his face when Baekhyun was looking at him again. “But really, tell me what you want to eat tonight. I’ll cook.”

Baekhyun didn’t bother to turn his head away this time. He just openly laughed right in front of Chanyeol. “I’m not letting you cook my food, Chanyeol. One, I don’t eat crap—which is probably how the food’s going to turn out. And two, I don’t want to die yet because you’re probably going to poison me.” After wiping a single tear away, Baekhyun said, “I’ll cook tonight.”

“How do I know that the food’s not going to turn up like crap or be poisoned?” Chanyeol mocked.

“Because if you died,” Baekhyun responded, “I wouldn’t have an income anymore, meaning I can’t buy books—or even worse, cardigans.”

Rolling his eyes, Chanyeol sighed. “What the fuck is with you and cardigans?”

Groaning, Baekhyun sat up into a sitting position. Then he threw his legs over the bed so that he was completely facing Chanyeol. Using his hands, Baekhyun re-explained his reasoning. “I told you. T-shirts and cardigans say ‘I’m c—’”

“—Casual,” Chanyeol finished, remembering the explanation. “Right, right. Casual—which you are, by the way. Sometimes too casual. Like your boxers right now.”

About down-right done with Chanyeol judging his comfortable choices in clothing, Baekhyun stood up right in front of Chanyeol. Since Chanyeol was sitting in a chair, he ended up having to look up at Baekhyun since the only thing that would’ve been in front of his face if he was looking straight was Baekhyun’s lower torso and crotch.

“What’s wrong with them?” Baekhyun asked, touching the fabric of his underwear. “It’s a nice color and it fits nicely. It’s perfectly breezy for the wind right now, so everything inside gets some nice air—”

“Uh—”

“—I don’t feel squished or pressured like I would with the jeans I usually walk around this god-forsaken house in—”

“Baek—”

“—So tell me what exactly is wrong with wearing boxers in my own room,” Baekhyun demanded, leaving most of his weight on one leg as he leaned back and crossed his arms.

Chanyeol frowned, but at the same time, he felt like he was in some awkward position. All he wanted to do was ask Baekhyun what he wanted to eat and here he was in a chair being told that everything inside those boxers was feeling “breezy”. The entire situation didn’t turn out like Chanyeol had thought it would.

Answering Baekhyun’s question, Chanyeol tried to keep an un-phased look on his face. “I’m just saying. Maybe you should at least put on your stupid pajama pants.”

“I’m in my own room, though,” Baekhyun pointed out. “I didn’t really expect anyone to come in here.” Then, Baekhyun let out a frustrated sigh before tilting his head, looking down on Chanyeol.

“Honestly, there’s nothing wrong with this,” he said, motioning to his “superstar!” boxers. “I’m not going to get a boner, if that’s what you’re worried about, okay? My dick’s not gonna rise like dough, stick out of this little tiny hole in the crotch area and head straight for a little oven called your mouth.”

God, Chanyeol wanted to die. The visual that Baekhyun had given him was too extreme. A boner that rose like dough? Into a little oven called his mouth? Chanyeol couldn’t keep eye contact anymore. He looked down, but that was a big fat mistake since he ended up staring at where Baekhyun’s boner would be if he had one. Chanyeol didn’t like the situation. He either had to look Baekhyun in the eye or look at Baekhyun’s crotch. None of the options seemed pleasing so Chanyeol opted out.

Scooting the chair back so he wasn’t so close to Baekhyun, Chanyeol got up and was soon the taller of the two. “Alright! I get it. Your balls are feeling breezy and that’s putting you in a fantastic mood. Fine. Wear whatever you want.”

When he was pivoting to leave, Baekhyun said, “As for the food tonight, take out the steak in the fridge.”

Chanyeol turned around. “You’re gonna make steak?”

Shrugging, Baekhyun sat back on his bed and scoffed. “I’m gonna marinate the meat. You’re gonna be the one to go outside and barbeque. ”

Chanyeol was about to argue, but then he reminded himself to go with whatever floated Baekhyun’s breezy boat. Anything to make the job easier, Chanyeol was going to do.

 

It was around five-thirty that Sehun and Kyungsoo were getting their shoes to leave. Baekhyun had changed into more decent bottoms, which Chanyeol was silently thankful for when he saw Baekhyun come out in jeans.

At the door, Baekhyun was chatting to Sehun and laughing as he played with his hair. Sehun kept telling him no, but never seriously pushed him away. It wasn’t until Chanyeol joined the three of them that all the shenanigans stopped and Sehun put a cap on, not bothering to fix the ruffled mess that Baekhyun made.

“Baek, I’ll be back in a few minutes,” Chanyeol said as he quickly slipped his shoes on. “I’m just going to drop them off at the bus station.”

“Okay.” Then Baekhyun turned to Kyungsoo and Sehun. “How far away are you guys traveling?”

Kyungsoo smiled while gripping onto a small bag that Baekhyun saw a while back. It was filled with tiny gifts, which Baekhyun figured were for children. “My family’s house is just a thirty minute drive from the station.”

“Mine’s forty-five minutes,” Sehun said as he stuffed his hands in his pocket. “Kyungsoo and I go on the same bus. He just gets off first. On the way back, I’m usually on the bus first, then Kyungsoo comes aboard later. We try to get back as soon as we can. Personally, I like being here more. That’s why I don’t spend too much time back home.”

“As for me, I can’t leave you guys to starve, so I try to get back late at night. Someone needs to be here in the morning to cook breakfast,” Kyungsoo said.

Baekhyun was about to respond, but Chanyeol finished putting his shoes on and had opened the door. Instead, Baekhyun smiled at the two and held up a hand. “I guess I’ll see you two tonight maybe.”

“We’ll try,” Sehun responded. “At least I will.”

Once Sehun and Kyungsoo were out the door, Chanyeol turned around to Baekhyun who was leaning on the door frame. “Marinate, but don’t start the grill until I get back. I don’t want my house to be on fire when I return. If it is on fire, then, Baekhyun, you better be inside.”

“Rude.”

Scoffing, Chanyeol turned around and began to follow Kyungsoo and Sehun to his car. “Keep the doors locked! Don’t listen to anything so loudly that you can’t hear a possible break in! Don’t play with electricity. Don’t answer the doors to strangers. Don’t—you know what? Just marinate, Baek. Just marinate and stand in a corner.”

As Baekhyun listened to Chanyeol’s stupid “do-not-do” list, he just smiled and nodded. When Chanyeol got in the car, Baekhyun just kept nodding, earning himself a frown from Chanyeol even as the car started to back away from the driveway.

Deciding to play with the guy, Baekhyun waved good-bye and stepped back inside the house without closing the door. Baekhyun stood against a wall and started to look over his nails. It wasn’t long before Baekhyun heard Chanyeol yell from his driver’s window.

“The door! Close the damn door!”

Laughing, Baekhyun turned back and closed the door properly.

 

In the backseat, Sehun couldn’t stop himself from cracking a few laughs. “He did that on purpose.”

 

When Chanyeol got back home roughly fifteen minutes later, he walked in Baekhyun working diligently in the kitchen. In the corner, Chanyeol saw that Baekhyun already had rice cooking in the rice cooker.

Chanyeol joined Baekhyun in the kitchen. Of course, Baekhyun didn’t greet Chanyeol back home like a normal maid—or a normal person—would. Instead, Baekhyun told Chanyeol to go outside and start the grill.

Not arguing, Chanyeol went to a nearby closet and grabbed a jacket for the cool, night breeze. When he returned, Baekhyun had finished with soaking the meat in the flavored liquid, but decided that he wasn’t quite ready to wash his hands just yet.

Instead, Baekhyun decided to walk up to Chanyeol and slap him right on the face with his dirty hands. Chanyeol froze for a second as he felt a few areas start to drip down his cheeks.

It only took the sharp voice of Baekhyun dying of his own laughter to snap Chanyeol out of his frozen state. He reached out to try and grab a hold of Baekhyun—possibly to try and strangle him—but Baekhyun was able to evade.

Chanyeol ended up trying to catch Baekhyun and circling the kitchen island a few times. The chase only ended when Baekhyun slipped on a small area where he had accidentally spilled some vinegar a while back. When Baekhyun fell, he tried to break the fall with his hands, but since they were slick and wet, they just slipped right under him and he ended up falling on his face.

The tables were flipped and it became Chanyeol’s turn to laugh at Baekhyun comical misfortune.


	8. How Things Function

After Chanyeol got his full view of Baekhyun whining on the floor, he nudged him with his foot. “I know I keep telling you to get on the floor, but I meant that in a way that involved you cleaning it.”

“Was that a joke?” Baekhyun retorted as he slowly pushed himself up. “Because if it was, it went in a little dry.”

Chanyeol scoffed as he moved to where Baekhyun had left the meat. Grabbing the bowl that they were in, Chanyeol eyed Baekhyun who was using the counter to keep himself up. “At least you didn’t break anything.”

“Right.” Baekhyun threw Chanyeol a look. “Wouldn’t want me suing you.”

“No, but what I do want you to do is clean that up so your sassy self doesn’t slip and fall again,” Chanyeol said, nodding to the small vinegar puddle. “And go wash after you’re done. I don’t want you smelling like vinegar.”

Baekhyun rubbed the cheek that broke his painful fall and kneaded it. He hissed, but nevertheless moved and bent his legs, trying to get some blood flowing through them, especially in the knee area.

“Fine,” he grumbled as he began to stiffly waddle himself out of the kitchen area.

Chanyeol walked over to back door, but turned his head just before Baekhyun disappeared in the hallway. “Change your clothes too.”

Baekhyun stopped walking and back tracked into view. “I changed three times today,” he said frowning.

Chanyeol raised a brow. “Well now you have jeans with vinegar on them. Change.”

Baekhyun paused for a second before tilting his head and offering a smile. “Wouldn’t it be more efficient to just blow dry—”

“—Baekhyun,” Chanyeol interrupted. “Change.”

Baekhyun dropped the smile and made a face before he turned back down the hall. “It would’ve been more efficient!” Baekhyun said with his voice echoing in the hallway.

“I didn’t want you smelling at the table!” Chanyeol called out as he slid the back door open. “I didn’t wanna feel like I was eating with a hobo!”

“I was homeless you know!” Chanyeol heard Baekhyun yell out from afar.

Snorting, Chanyeol stepped outside. “Homeless,” he muttered. “Right.”

The next time Chanyeol saw Baekhyun, he regretted not specifying how he wanted him to “change”. Upon hearing the back door slide open, Chanyeol turned his head around and realized his mistake when he saw what Baekhyun had changed into.

Gone were the jeans. The simple shirt and Baekhyun’s beloved cardigan were gone also. Instead, Baekhyun wore pajama pants with pink vertical stripes on them and a graphic T-shirt with a ketchup bottle saying “What’s up, Dog!” to a hot dog character.

Before Chanyeol could comment on his appearance, Baekhyun gave him a smug smile and a shrug, signaling the universal “I don’t care what you have to say so don’t even bother” body language.

Chanyeol settled to frowning before turning back around to keep his eyes on the cooking meat rather than on Baekhyun’s comfy appearance. His attention was only cut when he felt Baekhyun brush against his side. Looking down, Chanyeol asked, “What’re you doing?”

Hugging his arms from the cool night air, Baekhyun looked up, giving Chanyeol a nice view of his eyes in that fading sunset setting. “Checking to see if you’re cooking my steak right.”

Chanyeol looked away. “Go back inside, Baek. I’m not gonna burn them—”

“You misunderstood. You can burn yours as long as mine’s perfectly well done.”

Chanyeol stopped and looked at the sea with a blank face as he wondered whether he could commit murder by drowning Baekhyun in that perfectly cold and merciless water and still be able to cover up his death by the time Sehun and Kyungsoo got home.

The bastard didn’t care if he burnt his as long as the bastard’s steak came out perfectly fine? Chanyeol looked down to stare daggers at the shorter guy. The action would’ve been more effective if Chanyeol hadn’t seen that Baekhyun was shivering and gripping his arms.

It was then that Chanyeol noticed how close Baekhyun was actually standing next to him. In fact, the guy was pressuring himself against the giant body next to him as if trying to transfer heat over to himself. Chanyeol groaned and rubbed his forehead with a hand.

“Baekhyun, go inside,” he ordered.

Baekhyun snorted. “I’m not leaving my steak in your large hands.”

“Baekhyun,” Chanyeol repeated. “Go back inside if you’re fucking cold.”

“I’m fine,” Baekhyun insisted. “The smoke from the grill’s keeping me warm.”

Chanyeol wanted to hit Baekhyun. “Get out of smoke’s way! You’re going to end up smelling like meat and gas, you idiot.”

Despite the angry warning, Baekhyun just smiled and shrugged, keeping his eyes on the cooking meat. Out of annoyance, Chanyeol gently shoved Baekhyun off to the side. Much to his disappointment, Baekhyun scooted right next to him again.

“For fuck’s sake, Baekhyun!” Chanyeol set the spatula down. “Get the fuck inside!”

“Did you know that eating charred meat isn’t good for you?” Baekhyun informed him in a slightly stuttering voice, evading the demand. “It doesn’t taste good either.”

“Uh huh.”

“I heard that charred meat can add to your chances of getting colon cancer,” Baekhyun mindlessly said, keeping any awkward silences at bay. “Anything burnt is a health hazard. In fact, it’s—”

“Baekhyun, please shut up and just get the fuck inside,” Chanyeol groaned. “You’re jittering right now—”

“I’m like a life-sized human vibrator against you, aren’t I?”

Again, Chanyeol thought about drowning Baekhyun and killing him. Ignoring the remark, Chanyeol tried again. “Baekhyun—”

“If I’m a shaking vibrator, you’d be a dildo.” Baekhyun laughed at himself. “Get it?”

Fuck whoever it was in the Heavens that gave Baekhyun that mouth of his. Perhaps Chanyeol couldn’t kill Baekhyun, but suicide was also on the table. He could just as easily put his face on that grill and spare himself from any more of Baekhyun’s stupid words.

Letting Baekhyun know how frustrated he was, Chanyeol growled as he shrugged off his jacket and shoved it in Baekhyun’s folded arms. Baekhyun was taken aback at the forceful shoving of the jacket, but then he glanced up at its owner.

“Wear it and shut up.”

Baekhyun looked at the jacket for a second before he shrugged. He put it on to the best of his abilities, but the arms ended up being too long and Baekhyun just knew that he looked stupid. In his head, the jacket ruined the perfection of his pajama look.

As Chanyeol asked, Baekhyun stopped talking. He stood there, watching Chanyeol flip and press the steaks a few times. He glanced over and saw that Chanyeol had shoved his hand inside his pocket as a means to keeping that hand warm from the cool night air. Baekhyun almost felt bad for taking the jacket.

Almost.

Three minutes passed before Baekhyun yawned. “I’m bored.”

Chanyeol rolled his eyes, mentally cursing Baekhyun. “What’re you gonna do about it?”

Baekhyun thought for a moment before making up his mind. He backed away and turned around, heading back inside the house. “Come back when you’re done. If you don’t get mine just right, I’m not eating.”

“Will you stop being so snobby about how your meat will turn out!?” Chanyeol snapped, turning his head back.

Just before Baekhyun closed the sliding door behind him, he responded. “I don’t want colon cancer!” he cried as he shut the door.

Huffing, Chanyeol turned back around to deal with the rest of the cooking that he had to wait around and do. It took a minute and a half of shivering before he realized that Baekhyun had taken the jacket inside the house. Grumbling, Chanyeol went back to retrieve his jacket, but when he tried to slide the door open, he couldn’t. Chanyeol’s eyes darted to the handle on the other side and just about decided how he was going to end Baekhyun’s life.

The fucker had locked the door.

Baekhyun decided to let Chanyeol do his thing by leaving him alone. He went back inside and shrugged the jacket off, setting it back inside a nearby closet. He hadn’t realized that he accidentally locked the door until he walked back in the kitchen area and heard Chanyeol banging on the glass, scowling at him.

Even though he should’ve ran to open the door quickly, Baekhyun took his time walking over and unlocking it. When Baekhyun flicked that lock up, Chanyeol immediately slid that door wide open.

“Don’t lock the fucking door!”

“It was an accident,” Baekhyun replied honestly.

“Uh huh,” Chanyeol said disbelievingly. “Anyways, give me my jacket back.”

Baekhyun paused. Then he whined. “I just put that thing away.”

“Then go get it.”

Baekhyun frowned, but he went ahead and retrieved the jacket, moaning and groaning all the way. And when he was close enough, he threw it over. Chanyeol caught it, gave him a disapproving look before turning back around, thinking about how complicated Baekhyun was making things for him.

Once everything was cooked—perfectly cooked—Baekhyun set the table. He put a fair amount of rice on each of their plates and set two plain glasses by each of them. After the utensils were out, Baekhyun sat down and watched as Chanyeol set a steak for the both of them. Once Chanyeol put all his grilling gear in the sink, he walked towards the hallway.

“I’m changing my shirt. Don’t start eating.”

“Alright,” Baekhyun said dismissively. When he looked down on the meat, he tilted his head. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t exactly colon cancer free either.

When Chanyeol returned, Baekhyun expected him to sit down, but instead he opened the door to the cellar and went downstairs. Baekhyun wasn’t amused. He was hungry. But, deciding that manners were manners, he waited until Chanyeol came back with four bottles of wine—each a different brand.

Baekhyun’s eyes were wide as he watched Chanyeol set those bottles down right in front of him. “Is today some sort of holiday that involves four bottles of wine…” he muttered.

Chanyeol shook his head as he snatched up the basic glass cups that Baekhyun set and went to replace them with fine wine glasses. “We’re just eating dinner.”

“With four bottles of rich people wine.”

Chanyeol’s face was static. “It’ll help down the dinner.” Setting a glass in from of Baekhyun, Chanyeol took a hand and lifted his head up to him, wrenching Baekhyun’s attention away from the wine. “Besides, did you know,” Chanyeol started, mocking Baekhyun’s did-you-know voice, “that wine’s good for the heart?”

Baekhyun didn’t take the bait. “Of course, I do.”

“Well, then,” Chanyeol said as he sat down. “Let’s get started.”

It took three bottles of wine, a few cans of beer, two hours of mindless talk, and a half hour of drunken screaming across the table before Chanyeol got Baekhyun to stop talking about senseless facts about cats, colon cancer, cheesecake and other shit that Chanyeol wasn’t interested in.

Baekhyun was drunk and so was Chanyeol, but Chanyeol was still mildly conscious of everything. Watching Baekhyun, Chanyeol saw that drunk Baekhyun was a million times more talkative and prone to laughter than sober Baekhyun. It was weird, but Chanyeol didn’t know which side of Baekhyun was smarter. The drunk side, which sputtered out “did you know” facts, or the Byun Baekhyun side of him that was an inherited genius when it came to machines.

As Baekhyun eased and his mental consciousness slipped, allowing harbored words and secrets to come out of him, drunk Chanyeol decided that it was time to set everything aside and ask some questions. He reached in his pocket and took out his phone under the table, setting it on the seat next to him. Once he opened up a recording app and started the recording so that he wouldn’t forget their conversation the next morning, the gears started moving.

Leaning on the back of his seat, Chanyeol’s eyes lazily went to Baekhyun who was running his hands through his hair, messing it up. “Baekhyun…”

Baekhyun laughed when Chanyeol said his name. “Yes,” he sang in reply, slowly—and in a beautiful drunken manner—opening his eyes, looking straight at Chanyeol. “Yes, slave master Chanyeol?”

“What’re you doing here?” Chanyeol asked as his fingers twiddled with the rims of a half empty beer can. “Working for me?”

Baekhyun grinned, but he gave Chanyeol an unsure shrug with it. “I don’t know…I don’t even like cleaning,” he mumbled. As Baekhyun’s eyes drifted to the empty wine bottles, his attention from the topic was cut. “Did you know wine made from New York tastes horrible? It does, Chanyeol. It’s very bad. Bitter. Not good at all.”

Chanyeol creased his brows, not liking the fact that he was losing Baekhyun. Then he figured out how he could manipulate Baekhyun’s fact. “How—Ah, how do you know that, Baek?” Chanyeol asked. “Ever been to New York?”

Mindlessly, Baekhyun nodded as he set an elbow on the table and leaned his head against a hand. “My dad decided that I needed to get a feel of the real deal…” Baekhyun paused to deal with a hiccup. “He took me along and forced me to take a few days off college, that bastard. I ended up having a pile of work waiting for me when I got back,” he grumbled, reminiscing the frustration he had back in college. “Hated it.”

I’m sure you did, Chanyeol thought, watching the male. “But what do you mean ‘the real deal’, Baekhyun?”

Lazily shrugging, Baekhyun answered, “Business. Family business. Business dealing with stupid stuff.”

Chanyeol frowned. Stupid stuff? Creating and innovating inventions for the new age of technology was by—in no means— “stupid stuff”. Inventing patches that could be implanted in the brain and used to work a robotic arm to help those without certain limbs was not “stupid stuff”. In fact, if anything, it was all complicated stuff, but as Chanyeol analyzed Baekhyun’s response, he got a feeling that Baekhyun wasn’t interested in any of those things. He had to wonder why.

Cocking his head, Chanyeol asked, “What does your family’s business have to do with? Mind me asking?”

Baekhyun chuckled, but the laugh was hallow. “Machines. Robots. Chips…That sort of thing…” Then he groaned as he rubbed his eyes—probably due to the large consumption of alcohol. “Just like what you do, right Chanyeol?” he said, giving Chanyeol a drunken grin.

Chanyeol didn’t give a response. Even in his drunk state, he still knew that he had to be the one with the upper hand. “Baek, why don’t you just go home?”

Baekhyun paused before giving Chanyeol a sad smile. “Do you hate me so much that you want me to leave, Chanyeol?”

The look in his eyes genuinely made Chanyeol feel bad, but again, Chanyeol had to put those feelings and thoughts aside. He had to ask the question because his phone was recording. “Answer me, Baek. Why don’t you go home?”

Baekhyun shook his head before resting it on the table. “I don’t want to get married...”

Chanyeol noticed how Baekhyun’s voice sounded depressed. “Why not?” he had to ask. It was out of curiosity. He wanted to know what Baekhyun thought about marrying him.

“Arranged marriages are systematic.” Baekhyun lifted his head off the table and wriggled around on his chair. “It’s arranged. There’s no…you know, that uncertainty to it. It’s just a plan that you have to follow. Systematic. Organized. Mechanical…Robotic, almost…”

A short silence passed by. “Baekhyun—”

Before Chanyeol could finish, Baekhyun kept talking. “Which is something I hate, Chanyeol. I really do hate it. I hate how it functions.”

“How what functions?”

“Everything,” Baekhyun muttered, glancing down. “Romance novels…I like romance novels.”

Again, Chanyeol sensed them straying from the topic. “Baekhyun, what about functions? What about—”

Drunkenly waving a hand, Baekhyun cut him off. “I like romance novels because of the uncertainty the characters feel. Everyone knows they fall in love, but it’s like… They have to worry whether their captor will release them, though in most cases they end up making love, but that’s a given.”

Chanyeol had to keep his mouth shut in order to let Baekhyun keep talking.

“In stupid arranged marriages,” Baekhyun started, “it’s all a process. I’m supposed to let a third party chose my partner. I’m supposed to meet them. I’m supposed to like them, marry them, fuck with them, have spawns with them, and have this image with them. In romance novels, nothing feels obligated. They don’t feel obligated to fall in love with whoever they fall in love with. It just happens, Chanyeol...”

Baekhyun sighed. “In other words, arranged marriages are cold, mechanical systems. It’s loveless…”

Chanyeol swallowed. Seeing Baekhyun being totally honest was new and Chanyeol didn’t know how he felt about it. He sensed that this was Baekhyun’s vulnerable side, but either way, he gained an insight on Baekhyun’s functionality. As Chanyeol tried to ask another question, Baekhyun cut him again. This time, Chanyeol receded willfully. He decided that letting Baekhyun ramble was easier.

“Mechanical…Robotic…Systematic…” Baekhyun mumbled. “I hate those things because it just sounds so cold, so stiff, and so assembly line-ish. I know I said that my family deals with technology, but I have no interest in it…”

“Why not?”

“I don’t like machines,” Baekhyun simply said as he picked up a nearby can and opened it. “They have no feelings. They’re generic. They have no minds of their own. The only thoughts they have reflect the information inputted in by someone else.”

An elongated pause ensued for a moment. “There’s nothing spontaneous about machines, Chanyeol. They just follow orders…” Then, Baekhyun lifted his eyes up, showcasing Chanyeol his dark orbs. “And I’m not a robot...”

The mood had darkened so Chanyeol decided to feature one of those smiles that Baekhyun has repeatedly told him was creepy, big, large, and unnecessary. “I know you’re not, Baek.”

Drinking from the can, Baekhyun shot back with a satisfied grin and a more uplifted spirit. “I’ve done a good job at it, huh?”

Chanyeol cocked his head and heaved a shoulder. “Might’ve.”

“Yah,” Baekhyun said, unsatisfied. “Admit it.”

Conceding that he could agree and later say that it was just a drunk remark, Chanyeol nodded. “You’ve done good.”

Baekhyun let out a laugh, which seemed somewhat like music to Chanyeol’s ears after Baekhyun’s rants about depressing robots and how he hated things that functioned so coldly and systematically. Seconds and minutes go by without a word said. The smile on Baekhyun’s face slowly fades and Chanyeol’s eyes lazily drop down to everything on the dinner table.

Baekhyun was the first to move, scooting out of his chair and stumbling in the process. He took a hold of the table to stabilize himself. Staring blankly at the table, Baekhyun—beyond drunk at that point—tried his best to piece his drunken self together.

Watching Baekhyun was funny to Chanyeol, but it was all due to the alcohol. They both had a low tolerance of seriousness at the moment.

Tearing his eyes away from the table, Baekhyun took his plate and folded his fingers, indicating to Chanyeol that he wanted his also. “Give me your nasty plate, you messy eater.”

Chanyeol snorted. “Fine. But if you stumble and break these, it’s coming out of your pay,” he warned lightly.

Taking Chanyeol’s plate and stacking it on top of his, Baekhyun made a face. “I can walk straight.”

“By the way you’re wobbling, can you even see straight?”

Baekhyun let out a high laugh. “Hold up a finger and ask me how many!”

A finger? Chanyeol failed to comprehend and raised a single finger. Then he asked, “How many?” just like how Baekhyun wanted.

Baekhyun scoffed. “One!” He grinned. “See? I can see straight. I can see that you only—ah, have one finger up.”

The stupidity of the situation made Chanyeol break out into a grin. “Right. One.”

Baekhyun turned and slowly made his way over to the sink. Even though the distance wasn’t far, Baekhyun kept pausing to regain his balance and to make sure that he didn’t fumble and drop the plates because if he did that, that would be handing the satisfaction over to Chanyeol. Despite being drunk off his rockers, Baekhyun still had the mind to know that he shouldn’t let Chanyeol hold anything over him.

Once Baekhyun got to the sink, he fidgeted with turning on the water. He almost leaned in too much, but managed to fix his position. Baekhyun grabbed the sponge—though he knocked a few trinkets near the sink down in the process—and took one of the plates with his other hand.

Walking straight was a difficult task. Washing the dishes drunk was another case. To Baekhyun, it was like multitasking. He had to make sure that his legs supported him. Then he had to make sure he didn’t go cross-eyed and blurred his own vision, which would lead to him scrubbing his own arm. Another thing was that Baekhyun had to scrub with one hand while holding a plate steady in the other.

Everything. Too much. It was too much for Baekhyun at the moment.

Even the simple task of standing was a challenge. Baekhyun wobbled. Nine times out of ten, he was able to catch himself just in time, but that one out of ten times happened when he least expected it.

To his luck, Chanyeol saw it coming and rushed his own drunk and stumbling self to Baekhyun’s aid. He caught Baekhyun by the waist and stabilized the both of them. Everything would’ve been fine if Baekhyun hadn't forgotten to keep a hold of the plate in his hand, because he ended up dropping it.

Once the plate hit the hard floor, it shattered. Baekhyun winced when the sound rang in his ears. Then he looked up at the giant holding him. Meekly, Baekhyun offered a grin. “I’m sorry?”

“Baek—”

“Did you know that breaking plates in Greek tradition is a way of expressing happiness?” Baekhyun said, trying to ease the situation.

“Baekhyun, I don’t care.”

Baekhyun thought, but whatever ran through his head was a drunken thought. They were thoughts that were't thought out. They were ideas that weren't analyzed. They were unreasonable and unorthodox, but drunk Baekhyun didn’t want to be yelled at, so logic was out the window.

Baekhyun turned around. Then he stood of his toes. And in that fleeting moment, he placed a simple kiss on Chanyeol’s unexpecting lips.

“Did you know that kisses makes people happy?”

Ignoring the made up “did you know” fact, Chanyeol brashly asked, “What the hell was that?”

Baekhyun shrugged. “A spontaneous peace offering?”

“Spontaneous?”

Baekhyun glanced around before nodding. “Yes?”

Chanyeol stared at the guy. The kiss still lingered on his lips and he could still feel how Baekhyun’s felt against his. Chanyeol cursed. He was mad. He was caught off guard. Honestly, what was that? Chanyeol didn’t know. He didn’t even know how to respond or what that feeling in the pit of his stomach was. He didn’t know why he had this urge…this animalistic urge.

All because they were both too fucking intoxicated.

The world stopped revolving and the only thing Chanyeol heard was silence and the sound of his own heart beating. His head was also filled with thoughts, but like Baekhyun, they weren’t thorough. In the end, the situation was the same for both.

“To hell with it” was the last thing that Chanyeol thought to himself before he reached behind Baekhyun’s head and pulled his head back so that he was looking up at him clearly.

“You call that spontaneous?” Chanyeol muttered. He saw Baekhyun gulp as his eyes traced down the male’s neck. “This is spontaneous,” he declared before dropping his head down.

It was eight in the evening and both were not in their right mind anymore. Chanyeol was wearing a casual black shirt with dark blue jeans. Baekhyun was wearing his cartoon graphic tee along with his striped pajama pants. The kitchen had three empty bottles of imported wine and scattered empty cans of beer. And near the sink, there were two people who were both enjoying the unprecedented bliss of the word “spontaneous” as Chanyeol swooped down, possessively taking Baekhyun’s lips with his own.

There was nothing systematic about the act. It wasn’t planned. There was no obligatory duty to it. It was not a function.

It just happened.


	9. Almost Casual

A lot of things fell to the floor. Kyungsoo’s cute wooden kitchen trinkets fell to the floor when Baekhyun got pushed against the counter and his hands looked for something to hold onto. Sehun’s gardening memo was brushed off the fridge when Baekhyun tried to gain control of the situation by pushing Chanyeol back against it.

Not liking being the one pushed around, Chanyeol grabbed Baekhyun by the shirt and shoved him up against the wall while continuing to dominate the war their tongues were in. Hands up inside Baekhyun’s shirt, Chanyeol felt his soft skin against his finger tips. It was then that Chanyeol decided that he hated the stupid graphic tee that Baekhyun decided to sport. Hands on the hem, Chanyeol pulled away to pull the stupid shirt off, adding it onto the list of things that ended up on the floor because of their lusty escapade.

Pushing and pulling each other down the hallway, picture frames became tilted from being brushed against. Chanyeol’s black shirt drifted on the hard wooden floors and by the time they had reached their area, Baekhyun had undone the front of his jeans.

They had the decision between two doors. Either Baekhyun’s or Chanyeol’s. Chanyeol was going to move them to his, but Baekhyun grabbed Chanyeol by the neck and pulled them along to his instead. Following his lead, Chanyeol pushed them inside the room, kicking the door closed.

Chanyeol backed Baekhyun up until Baekhyun felt the edge of his bed at the back of his knees. Falling back, Baekhyun dragged Chanyeol down with him. Scooting up the mattress, Baekhyun spread his legs and Chanyeol settled in between them.

Leaning in, Chanyeol’s bare chest brushed against Baekhyun’s. The shot rushing through Chanyeol’s veins was eccentric, but he pushed it aside, reasoning that it was the alcohol. His elbows kept him elevated, hovering over Baekhyun as he continued to suck and nip at his lips.

Working on their own, Chanyeol’s hips began to move and grind against Baekhyun’s open conjunction. Chanyeol’s cock within its confines was growing and it was already hard. Baekhyun could feel it through the thin fabric of his pajama pants.

What the hell was happening? What were they doing? How did it get to this? The questions floated in the air, but Baekhyun and Chanyeol openly ignored the tiny bit of logic in their head. The questions lingering around were intoxicated with unrelenting, in-the-moment lust and it would stay that way until that lust was out of their system—that or someone snapped out of Lust’s trance.

Chanyeol broke the kiss and untangled himself from Baekhyun’s arms. Within a few seconds, he slipped out of those dark blue jeans and out of his boxers. When he rejoined Baekhyun, he should’ve known that the guy would make some sort of remark.

“Impressive.”

Chanyeol scoffed. It was a déjà vu remark to what Baekhyun had said the first day that they met. Putting his hands at the bands of Baekhyun’s pajama pants and underwear, Chanyeol stripped them down. Once he got rid of them, they fell to the floor.

“Didn’t have to rip them off that harsh,” Baekhyun commented in a hoarse voice.

“I hated looking at them anyways so who cares,” Chanyeol murmured before moving back in between Baekhyun’s legs and recapturing his lips.

With a hand, Chanyeol gathered both of their stiffening cocks and began to rub them against each other, creating friction that felt too sinfully good. Baekhyun let out a soft moan right into Chanyeol’s receiving mouth, running his fingers up against the broad chest hovering over him.

The feeling of soft, delicate hands against his torso enflamed Chanyeol’s very being and made his hips snap faster, rubbing and clutching harder at their two seeping members. The urge was too big for a mere rub-together to satisfy Chanyeol.

Chanyeol pulled back and stuck two fingers in his mouth while Baekhyun tried to reach down and touch himself while raising his legs. Placing his slick fingers against Baekhyun’s clench-tight opening, Chanyeol nudged the tip of one finger in, slowly sliding it inside Baekhyun’s warm body. His other hand kept Baekhyun’s leg up and stable despite Baekhyun’s fidgeting and small physical reactions to having Chanyeol’s fingers inside of him.

A few moments later, Chanyeol added the second one. Splitting his fingers apart, Chanyeol made sure to stretch Baekhyun to his limits. There was no lubricant available so he had to do whatever it took to make the intercourse easier on the male under him. This need to make Baekhyun comfortable popped a small question inside Chanyeol’s head.

Why did he care if Baekhyun enjoyed it or not? Chanyeol didn’t know. All he knew in that foggy head of his was that he saw Baekhyun as the quirky, childish guy that he was. In other words, Baekhyun—in Chanyeol’s head—had the words “delicate and fragile” stamped on him. Unlike the plate that Baekhyun dropped in the kitchen, Chanyeol didn’t want to break him.

At his limit, Chanyeol pulled out. Baekhyun let out a gasp when he felt those long fingers being extracted from his body. It almost made him feel disappointed, but Chanyeol had in-avertedly given him time to snap out of that hold that lust had over him. Baekhyun’s mind was in a mess. He just knew that he felt good. Too good, in fact that it should’ve been wrong.

Wrong…The word echoed in Baekhyun’s drowning head. He felt the tip of Chanyeol’s cock brush teasingly against his ass. His conscience of reason began to come its way back to his brain and it wasn’t until Chanyeol placed the tip of his cock to his open cleft that Baekhyun heard his head screaming at him that what was happening was wrong.

With his hands, Baekhyun pushed against Chanyeol’s chest. “Stop…” he croaked. When Chanyeol decided to ignore him, Baekhyun tried to move his ass away from Chanyeol’s cock, treating it like a dangerous weapon. Even as he tried, Chanyeol kept him still, though, now his attention was on Baekhyun.

“What’re we doing?” Baekhyun asked in a broken whisper.

Chanyeol glazed over Baekhyun’s questioning eyes. “I don’t know, but I don’t care anymore. Now—”

“No.” The word came out quickly—just as quickly as Baekhyun set his legs down and moved farther up the bed, away from Chanyeol’s shocked and confused self. “We’re not doing this,” Baekhyun frantically declared. He only stopped moving when his movement made him slightly nauseous.

Chanyeol was out of his shock. His throbbing—highly unsatisfied—cock made him angry. “Are you fucking serious? Stop playing.”

He tried to reach for Baekhyun, but Baekhyun moved out of the way. He rolled over to the edge of the bed and quickly got off. Baekhyun stumbled and almost fell on the floor, but he somehow managed to stay upright. He turned back around to the bed to see Chanyeol looking dangerously frustrated and angry as he set his feet on the floor.

“Baekhyun, get the fuck back in this bed and—”

Baekhyun shook his head. “We can’t.” Even when Chanyeol stood towering over him, Baekhyun mustered up some drunken courage and started pushing and pulling Chanyeol closer and closer to the door.

Chanyeol tried to get Baekhyun to stop, but one way or another, Baekhyun managed to push him closer and closer to the exit. Oddly enough, Chanyeol didn’t find himself going soft by the turn of events. Subconsciously, he knew it was because of Baekhyun using his naked body to try and herd him along. The brushing of skin on skin—of Baekhyun’s own cock against Chanyeol’s leg—was still enough to keep the drunk Chanyeol hard and alive.

Baekhyun tried to give Chanyeol one last shoulder shove out the door, but Chanyeol caught a hold of the frame. “Baekhyun, quit fucking around, damn it!”

Turning his eyes’ focus on Chanyeol’s fingers, Baekhyun tried to pry them off the frame. While Baekhyun tried to release Chanyeol’s hold, Chanyeol used his other hand to grab Baekhyun by the shoulder and turn him around to face him.

“What kind of fucking game are you playing, Baek?” Chanyeol growled angrily.

Baekhyun, again, shook his head. He decided that physical force wasn’t going to do. Standing on his toes, Baekhyun placed a hasty kiss on the side of Chanyeol’s cheek. He knew it wouldn’t do the trick so with his hands, he touched Chanyeol by the shaft and gave it a tug—enough to make Chanyeol forget his mind for a second.

As Chanyeol was taken aback by the kiss and touch, Baekhyun took advantage of Chanyeol's drop of offense and pushed him completely out of the room. “Sorry!” he quickly said before shutting the door right in front of a naked Chanyeol’s face.

Chanyeol wasn’t done though. He wasn’t done being confused. He wasn’t done being angry. He wasn’t done being completely hard and unsatisfied.

Pounding on the door, Chanyeol raged. “Baekhyun! Open this door!” When he heard nothing in response, Chanyeol kept hitting it. “Open the fucking door or I will break this down! Whatever game you’re playing, it’s not funny! Damn it—Baekhyun!” He gave the door one last pound. “I fucking fingered you, you asshole!”

Finally, Chanyeol received a response, though it wasn’t one that he was expecting. “I’ll return the favor someday—ahhh…”

Chanyeol froze. “What the fuck was that ‘ahhh’ for? Baekhyun, what’re you doing?”

“Trying to get rid of—nghhh—this,” Chanyeol heard Baekhyun groan out.

Chanyeol clenched his jaw. Baekhyun was fucking masturbating to get release—release that Chanyeol should’ve ignited. It made him angry. “Baekhyun!” Chanyeol barked. “There’s no masturbating in this damn house! Stop it!”

There was a silence before Chanyeol could hear Baekhyun’s loud, muffled moan. “Sorry.”

Chanyeol let out a frustrated growl as he touched himself, finding that Baekhyun’s muffled moan had some erotic effect on him. “You know, for a guy who hates machines, you’re just as fucking cold as one.” Chanyeol hit the door again. “Stop this game and let me back in! Baekhyun, you can’t just fucking leave me like this. I’m still hard! I’m—”

It was odd, but Chanyeol suddenly sensed that he wasn’t alone in that hall. He turned his head—hand still on his cock—and froze. “S-Sehun…”

Sehun’s jaw was on the floor. It hung open. He tried several times to say something, but he couldn’t. He found that his throat wasn’t functioning. His eyes were able to function, though. The fact that they drifted down to Chanyeol’s groin area was enough to indicate what was going through his head.

“Sehun, this…It’s—”

Sehun slowly shook his head as his voice came back. “I…didn’t want to see that,” he mumbled before looking back at Chanyeol in the eyes. “I thought someone broke in and trashed the house, but I see that it was just…you two.” Sehun paused before slowly starting to walk backwards. “I think that I should just…go to my room.”

Chanyeol snapped out of the shock and covered his private part. “Sehun, about this, it’s—”

“—I kind of…don’t wanna…know…” Sehun slowly said. “But you might wanna take care of that…”

“Sehun—”

There was no point to it. Sehun just raised his brows and shook his head, telling Chanyeol that he didn’t want to hear it. Chanyeol watched as Sehun turned around and began walking normally to Kyungsoo and his wing of the house.

Cursing, Chanyeol angrily walked across the hall to his room still going hard and still trying to find release.

 

Morning came and Baekhyun woke up feeling fine other than a slight headache. He remembered everything, but it wasn’t like he had any power over the capacity in his brain for memory. Getting out of bed, he immediately took notice to his naked body. He didn’t even need to question what happened to him, because he already knew. That was the downside of having really great memory. No matter how drunk Baekhyun got, he would still be able to recall ninety percent of what happened during his alcohol high.

Though Baekhyun remembered, he didn’t feel shy or awkward about what happened. It wasn’t like him. It wasn’t “his style” to feel awkward. It was like him to be awkward, not feel like it. So, in that mindset, Baekhyun decided to act casual since he was Baekhyun and Baekhyun liked casual—casual clothes, casual food, casual talk, and casual I-almost-let-you-give-me-the -fuck-of-my-life sex.

Getting cleaned up, Baekhyun went to go get dressed in his usual apparel: a simple shirt, a complimenting cardigan, and nicely fitted jeans. No graphic tees and no striped pajama pants.

After he washed his face, Baekhyun began to make his way over to Chanyeol’s room. He expected a storm from Hell. In fact, Baekhyun was pretty sure that Chanyeol was waiting behind his door, ready to chop off his balls for last night.

Thinking about what happened last night, Baekhyun didn’t feel bad. He didn’t want to have sex, though it was amusing to him how he needed a hand job, Chanyeol’s cock against his, and one fantastic fingering session to realize that. Chanyeol was his employer. Baekhyun was his maid. It might’ve taken Baekhyun a while to remind himself of that in his drunken state, but he did get there in time for him to stop Chanyeol from going any further.

At first, Baekhyun knocked on the door for safety precautions. He didn’t want Chanyeol to yell “Banzai!” and come out from behind the door just to stab him with a knife. When Baekhyun received no answer, he entered the room cautiously. He stuck his head in and was satisfied to see a large lump on the bed. Baekhyun figured that Chanyeol was under those covers.

Walking to the edge of the bed, Baekhyun woke Chanyeol up the usual way. “Wake up! Get up, get up, get up,” he repeated as he shook the bed. “I haven’t taken any pills for this headache so I feel like absolute shit right now!” Baekhyun said in a weird, cheerful voice.

When Chanyeol didn’t move, Baekhyun grinned. “Poor baby, do you have bad mornings after a night of drinking?” He laughed at himself as he walked over to Chanyeol’s side. “Come on, Chanyeol. Wake up. I want to go take some pills for this headache already.” When Chanyeol didn’t move, Baekhyun laid a hand on the large lump on the bed. “Hey! It’s time to get up—”

Baekhyun stopped short. As he was pulling his hand away, Chanyeol’s hand suddenly shot out from under the covers and grabbed him. Smiling down on Chanyeol, who already looked angry, Baekhyun tried to shake Chanyeol’s grip off. “Well, good morning.”

Chanyeol skipped the greeting. He pulled Baekhyun on the bed with a force. Without giving him a chance, Chanyeol got on top of him, locking Baekhyun with legs on either side of him.

The situation would’ve been fine. Their positions would’ve been fine also. It all would’ve been fine and dandy if Chanyeol was actually dressed like a normal person. Instead, Baekhyun found himself straddle to the bed by a naked mad man who looked like he was suffering from a hangover and lack of sleep.

Trying to ease the mood, Baekhyun’s eyes went to Chanyeol cock before looking up at him. “I see you have no morning wood. That’s good!” he said, offering a smile.

Chanyeol wasn’t amused in any way. “I have a good mind to kill you right now.”

“Oooh, a classic,” Baekhyun grinned. “A man killing his maid. I think this is network show worthy, don’t you think?”

“Shut up,” Chanyeol spat. “What the fuck was last night? Hm? What the fuck was that!?”

Baekhyun shrugged. “It was dinner. It was us drinking. Then it was us going to sleep,” he said, trying to stupidly fool Chanyeol.

“Wrong,” Chanyeol said, not buying into Baekhyun’s fake info. “We had dinner. We drank. Then we did fucking oral like our lives depended on it, but at the last minute—with me getting ready to shove it in you—you started acting fucking haywire, pushing me out of the room, and leaving the both of us with unsatisfied problems.”

Baekhyun raised a brow. “Nice memory.”

Ignoring him, Chanyeol pushed on. “Now tell me what was that? What the fuck happened? It’s all because of you that Sehun had to fucking see me out naked in the hall and—”

“Well,” Baekhyun said, looking like he was thinking about it, “if I hadn’t pushed you, wouldn’t Sehun have seen us doing something that we shouldn’t have been doing in the first place?”

Chanyeol opened his mouth to respond, but he had nothing. It was true. It was either Sehun seeing him naked or Sehun walking in on them being a couple of drunk, horny idiots. Chanyeol didn’t want either one to happen, but fate decided against him last night.

“And that’s the thing,” Baekhyun said coolly. “We shouldn’t have been doing that in the first place. It felt nice, don’t get me wrong. You’re a very passionate person, kind of like Dimitri from the book Secret Fire, but he was Russian, not Korean, plus he was a prince, but—” When Baekhyun saw the look on Chanyeol’s face, he knew that he was getting carried away. “Anyways, I didn’t want to have sex. I’m sorry. Ah, I feel like a runaway from who left her husband-to-be at the altar.” Baekhyun sighed before cocking his head to the side, giving Chanyeol a grin. “You’re the employer. I’m the maid. Sex is a no go.”

“Employer this. Maid that.” Chanyeol glared. “It was in the moment, Baek. I think you’re weird. I think that you’re a god damn freak with a childish sense of fashion, but last night, you should’ve just gone with it. When people lust, they lust. And when that happens, they just let it happen. It would’ve been just sex. Both of us would’ve been satisfied. No strings attached.”

Baekhyun lost the smile in his eyes, though there was one still plastered on his face. “Just sex, huh?”

“Yes.”

“I know I’m pretty casual, Chanyeol,” Baekhyun started, “but I’ve had enough casual sex. I know how to deal with the mornings following it so that’s why I’m so calm right now, but I’m bored of it so I’m not looking for any more.” Baekhyun lifted a hand and gave Chanyeol a pat on the chest. “Now, get off me. I’m not a horse and I’m smaller than you. You’re crushing me.”

“Baek—”

Chanyeol froze when he heard someone clear their throat. He looked up as Baekhyun tried to crane his head to look at the door almost. At the frame, Sehun stood there with a half-assed smile while Kyungsoo stood beside him with a similar expression.

“We, uh…” Kyungsoo tried to speak. “We thought that you two would need some help waking up after the night that you two probably had with all that, um, alcohol, but I see that you two are perfectly fine.”

After that, Kyungsoo turned around and began to go back in the kitchen to finish cooking. Sehun trailed after him. His “I told you we should’ve just left them alone” echoed in the hallway enough for Chanyeol and Baekhyun to hear.


	10. Mange Une Bite

Chanyeol looked like a murderer on edge. His hands were gripping hard on his mug and his intense stare at the dining table made it plainly obvious that his mind was a million miles away. Kyungsoo tried to get the attention of his distracted employer three times before finally being successful. When Chanyeol snapped out of his trance, he looked up to Kyungsoo who was standing behind the sink counter.

“I’m sorry,” he said, still sounding a bit distracted. “What were you saying?”

“I said,” Kyungsoo repeated as he wiped the counters, “when I was cleaning the kitchen, I found your phone on one of the chairs.” Turning the faucet on, Kyungsoo washed his hands. Then he wiped them dry before moving around the structure and walking over to Chanyeol, taking the cellphone out of his pocket. “It ended whatever you were recording once the app hit its recording limit.”

Taking the cellphone from Kyungsoo, Chanyeol bitterly looked at it. It was just another reminder of what happened last night. He couldn’t delete the audio, though, since it was crucial info, but at the same time, the importance of the information on that recording was overshadowed by Baekhyun and his taunting little ass.

“You know,” Kyungsoo said after a while of watching Chanyeol frown at his cellular device, “I was wondering what the hell happened to the place while Sehun and I were gone.”

Chanyeol scoffed as he placed the phone down. “Things that never should’ve happened.”

Bobbing his head from side to side, Kyungsoo shrugged. “Maybe. I was more interested in what happened to the kitchen, though, so I hope that you don’t mind, but I might’ve listened to the recording.”

Chanyeol blinked. “The recording?”

Kyungsoo nodded. “I got more than I bargained for, really.”

“So you heard Baekhyun talk about his personal life?”

“I heard you two talk, then I heard you two doing other things,” Kyungsoo said nonchalantly. He pulled out a chair and took a seat. “But it got me curious—”

“—There’s nothing going on between the two of us,” Chanyeol groaned. He pushed his mug of coffee away. “It just—”

“Not about that,” Kyungsoo cut in. “I meant Baekhyun and your little interrogation.” Kyungsoo glanced down for a second. “It sounded as if he’s from some sort of high society, Chanyeol.”

Chanyeol paused for a second before reluctantly nodding. “Yes, it did…”

“Why?”

Chanyeol pursed his lips. He glanced over at Kyungsoo, his cook, who had been working for him ever since he moved in. Kyungsoo was a friend. He was trust worthy. With that, Chanyeol decided to let it slip.

“He’s Byun Baekhyun.” Chanyeol watched Kyungsoo for a reaction, but Kyungsoo continued to look blank. “The son of that family I told you about.”

Kyungsoo froze before he creased his brows. “The family that you met with weeks ago?” Then it clicked in Kyungsoo’s mind. “Byun Baekhyun. He’s the son of the people from Byun Enterprise…”

Chanyeol clicked his tongue. “Yep.”

“Wow, okay,” Kyungsoo said a little taken aback. “So let’s see if I have this straight. He’s part of the company that’s been known to steal your company’s intelligence. He’s also the son of the family you met with weeks ago concerning that marriage deal, so then that must mean he’s your future brother-in-law…”

“Yes, yes, no.” Chanyeol turned his head out to the glass window where he could see Baekhyun standing next to Sehun as he was holding a green hose and watering the lawn as always. In his opinion, Chanyeol thought Baekhyun was standing unnecessarily too close to the guy who caught him out in the nude the night before.

Following Chanyeol’s gaze, Kyungsoo asked, “What do you mean no?”

“That sarcastic bitch right there? Byun Baekhyun? That’s not my future brother-in-law.” Chanyeol let out a bitter scoff while shaking his head. “No. That’s my future bride-to-be.”

Kyungsoo’s eyes almost popped out of their sockets. “Bride!?” He paused. “Chanyeol, what’s he doing here? Working as your maid? How long have you known!?”

Chanyeol knew that questions would ensue his announcement, but he was ready and prepared for it all. “What’s he doing here? I don’t know yet, but with last night’s questioning, I think he might’ve ended up here by mistake after he ran away. Maybe. I’m not sure yet whether he had other motives, but I don’t think so…” Chanyeol sighed. “I found out the day I met him. The old woman did a background check on him.”

Kyungsoo frowned. “Chanyeol, how come you didn’t recognize him the minute you saw him? Why did you need your grandmother telling you about the background check for you to realize that he’s a Byun.”

“I thought he looked familiar…I just didn’t know where I saw him before.” Chanyeol leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. “The photos that I saw of him weren’t exactly up-to-date. The photos I was given were his high school photos, but still, I probably only glanced at them a year ago.”

“Does he know who you are?”

Chanyeol shrugged. “I don’t know. It doesn’t seem like it.”

It took ten minutes of Baekhyun’s mindless talking about food and ocean water before Sehun started to loosen up despite having caught Baekhyun in a situation with Chanyeol that was more or less of a flattering situation to be in. After a while, Sehun felt more comfortable.

“So, what, uh, happened last night?” Sehun asked when the opportunity arose. He didn’t feel weird or awkward asking about it. He was just curious.

“Wine and alcohol,” Baekhyun said as-a-matter-of-factly.

“Oh.”

“Speaking of wine, did you know that New York tastes bad?” Baekhyun said, repeating the fact he told to Chanyeol.

“How do you know? Have you been to New York?”

“Yep,” Baekhyun said, nodding. “Which reminds me, you wanna know how I discovered the love of my life?”

Sehun raised a brow as he stopped gripping on the hose. “You already found the love of your life?” he asked, making his way over to the side of the house to shut the water off. Baekhyun followed.

“Yes,” Baekhyun said grinning. “I was at a restaurant and one of my dad's associates ordered dessert for all of us. Then, there she was. She came in the form of eight ounces of cream cheese, graham crackers, sugar, milk, and vanilla all mixed in together.” As Sehun bent over to shut the water off, Baekhyun leaned against him, and whispered in his ear: “Cheesecake.”

The moment the door slid open, the house was filled with Baekhyun and Sehun’s laughter, evoking the attention of both Kyungsoo and Chanyeol who were still sitting at the table. Baekhyun had his arm on Sehun’s shoulder, seeming as though he was whispering something in Sehun’s ear.

“What’re you laughing about?” Chanyeol asked.

Sehun’s laughter died, but he still had a grin on his face. Baekhyun, on the other hand, let Sehun go and tilted his head at Chanyeol. “I was just telling him a funny story.”

“Well, I like to laugh so tell me the story, too,” Chanyeol ordered.

After shutting the door, Baekhyun shrugged. “Mange une bite.” Just before Baekhyun disappeared in the hallway to use the bathroom, he paused. “Long story short, I once had a spontaneous mission to learn how to say a certain phrase in five different languages. So, for that, excuse my French.”

Chanyeol was still confused when Baekhyun was long gone. The next person on his target hit list was Sehun. Turning to the nineteen year old who was pouring himself a new cup of coffee, Chanyeol called out to him.

“What did he say to me?”

Sehun hummed. “It’s not really my place to say, but if you really want to know…” Then he trailed off.

Chanyeol was annoyed. “Sehun. What did Baekhyun say to me?”

Running a hand through his hair, Sehun repeated the story Baekhyun told him. “Apparently, Baekhyun’s dad used to take him to a lot of places. He said he needed a way to tell pretentious, high-horse-riding ‘assholes’—his words not mine—to go away if he wasn’t interested. That’s why he said that it was a goal of his to learn how to tell these people off in five different languages.”

“So?” Chanyeol asked. “What the hell was that? That thing that he said to me?”

Lifting the coffee up to his lips, Sehun took a second to taste the brew before shrugging carelessly and moving over to the living room.

“He told you to go eat a dick.”

The phone rang, breaking the silence in the house after Sehun told Chanyeol the meaning of “mange une bite”, which Chanyeol had no intention of doing. He was irked again by Baekhyun and the Heavens only knew how much he hated the guy at the moment for mocking him. Never again would he allow himself to be drunk around that guy. Alcohol and lust would only end up with him bearing his naked truths in front of a nineteen year old gardener and part-time apprentice.

Kyungsoo walked over to a corner and picked up the house phone. He greeted the person on the other side and listened for a while before setting the phone against his chest. Chanyeol raised his brows, telepathically asking who was calling.

“It’s for Baekhyun,” Kyungsoo said.

Before Chanyeol could say anything, Sehun called. “Baek! Phone call! For you!”

Seconds later, Baekhyun came out from the hallway, wiping his damp hands on his jeans. He walked over to Kyungsoo to take the phone. As he was turning away, he had to ask. “Why’re you looking at me like that?” he said with a little laugh.

Kyungsoo wasn’t aware that he was looking at Baekhyun differently. He just smiled and shook his head. “It’s nothing.”

“Okay,” Baekhyun replied, giving Kyungsoo a grin. Placing the phone to his ear, Baekhyun began to walk back to his room for some privacy. “Hello?” he greeted in a voice that sang.

Chanyeol, sitting at the table, glared. “Hey! You don’t get phone call privileges in this house!”

Baekhyun whipped his head around and gave Chanyeol a frowning look. “No, no. Don’t mind that. It’s nothing,” he said into the phone. “It’s just the guy I work for thanks to you.” Just before he disappeared from Chanyeol’s sight, Baekhyun’s voice was clearly audible when he said: “Yeah, yeah. I told him that, but I don’t think he understood…”

Lying on the bed, Baekhyun got comfortable. “So why’re you calling?”

On the other side of the line, he could hear Kai sigh. “I haven’t talked to you in a few weeks.”

“I know,” Baekhyun said in a sure tone. “Because you never called to check up on me, you twat.”

“You gave me a home phone number,” Kai defended. “I didn’t want to seem like a bother—Why haven’t you gotten a cellphone like I told you before you left?”

“I haven’t found the time,” Baekhyun said. “I don’t even have a ride to use to go into town. There are only two cars here. One’s for Park—you know, the guy who owns this place—and then the other car is for the people working in this house, but Park won’t let me drive it—or stand by it, or look at it, or whatever. He just doesn’t let me near that thing.”

“Why? Don’t you have your license and I.D with you?”

“I’m trying to keep my identity on the down low, smart one,” Baekhyun laughed.

“Right, well hey, listen, I need a small favor,” Kai started. “I may have—kind of—perhaps gotten myself fired.”

Baekhyun frowned. “Why?”

On the phone, Baekhyun would hear Kai let out a frustrated groan. “You know, I’ve worked for this catering place for two years—two! And the one time I accidentally slip and spill something on a client, I get the boot. It’s fucking ridiculous, these people.”

“So what do you want me to do about it?” Baekhyun asked. “Money? I can’t take money out of my account right now.”

“I don’t want your money, Baek,” Kai assured. “I just…Can you help me get a job there? At least for now?”

Baekhyun sat up on his bed. “Kai, I don’t think Park needs an ex-caterer on call.”

“You know I can do more than hold a platter, Baek,” Kai said in a sighing voice. “I can cook, too. I know that all we ate was ramen at my house, but being with chefs for two years really improved my own skills.”

“We already have a cook here,” Baekhyun mumbled. “His name’s Kyungsoo. And just on a side note, I think Park’s a little gay for him, but that’s just how I kind of see it…”

“Look, I’ll do anything your gay boss wants,” Kai tried. “Except for sex. I don’t do gay.”

“Ah, but do you do gay-for-pay?”

“Can we not?” Kai asked, cutting the tangent off short. “Besides, I’m being stalked over here so I kind of just wanna leave for a bit.”

“Stalked?” Baekhyun said. The playfulness in his voice faded. “What do you mean?”

“I just feel like someone’s always following me? I don’t know.” Kai sighed. “Like, a car’s been parked in front of my apartment for a while now, but the funny thing is that it’s also the same car parked outside my work a few times. I checked. License plate and all. It’s becoming less and less frequent, but still. It was weird when it was happening.”

Baekhyun paused for a second. “Is that so...”

“I think it’s your parents’ doing though,” Kai mumbled. “They’re kind of stepping up their game. I saw you on the news last night. They might’ve looked in on me just for precaution.”

Baekhyun grimaced. That would mean that he would have to basically chew on the cable cords just to hinder the chance of Chanyeol seeing him on the television. “Okay. I’ll try and get you a position. The guy hired a nineteen year old to water flowers, Kai. I wouldn’t be surprised if he hired you to stand on top of the roof to hold a solar panel.”

“Thanks, Baek,” Kai said gratefully.

“No problem.” Baekhyun got off his bed. “When’re you coming?”

“Can I come over today?” Kai asked. “I already have my essentials packed in a backpack…”

Baekhyun rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Um, okay. I’ll tell him that you’re a friend who’s coming over to visit first, then I’ll just take it from there. I’ll pick you up at the station.”

“I thought you said you couldn’t drive any of the cars?”

“I’ll just find a way to get my skillful hands on those keys. If I can’t get the keys, then I’ll just have to hot wire the car, then.”

Not even a second after he left his room, Baekhyun met with Chanyeol in the hallway. “Hey!” Chanyeol didn’t respond. He only gave Baekhyun a glare before trying to walk past him. Baekhyun side stepped him. “Can I talk to you?”

“No.” Chanyeol tried to push Baekhyun off to the side, but Baekhyun fought against it.

“It’ll only take a second,” he said, grinning and trying to make his proposition more attractive.

“Yeah, and it’ll only take me a second to fire you,” Chanyeol threatened. “Now get out of the way. I have work.” Managing to push Baekhyun away, Chanyeol walked towards his room. Baekhyun followed.

“Right, you have to work on your designs and all, which, by the way, you might want to fix the design on the arms. It’s going to need the ability to create leverage if it’s going to be carrying anything—sorry, I might’ve seen the designs,” Baekhyun said, waving his hands in the air when Chanyeol gave him a wide-eyed look. “Anyways, off topic! But, my friend’s coming over. I hope that’s cool because he’s on his way. Oh, and can I use the car? I need to pick him up. I know I’m not allowed to even think about that car for stupid reasons other than not having a license, but I don’t think that you—”

Chanyeol stopped and walked over to Baekhyun, covering his mouth with his hand. “Do you honestly think you’re on my good side? Enough to be inviting people over and taking the car off to god knows where?” he asked, moving Baekhyun back until he had him against the wall. Baekhyun raised a brow before Chanyeol felt a smile form under his hand. When Baekhyun decided to lick his hand, Chanyeol pulled it away, scowling.

“No, but I can’t help it now. He’s coming over,” Baekhyun said tilting his head. “Can I have the car or do I have to hot wire and carjack it for a few minutes?”

Chanyeol paused. “You know how to hot wire cars?”

“Maybe. Maybe not.”

Chanyeol cursed before he pointed a finger at Baekhyun. “I swear, Baekhyun. You need to stop doing things without my damn permission. Whether that’s seducing me or inviting people over, you can’t do that type of shit!”

“One, I didn’t seduce you,” Baekhyun started, chuckling, “and second, at least I informed you beforehand ,and you didn’t have to find out by going into the garage and seeing that one of your cars was missing.”

Chanyeol took a moment to just breathe for a bit. He didn’t know what to tell the guy. No? How could he say that when Baekhyun already told him that his friend was on his way? Chanyeol couldn’t help, but glare at the guy who had the audacity to tell him to go eat a dick in French, but then turn around and ask for the keys to the helpers’ car, which he banned Baekhyun from just because he felt like it.

Grunting, Chanyeol gave Baekhyun a sharp look. “The next time you invite a friend over, check with me or I swear, if one of my designs or prototypes gets stolen, I will make your life a living hell.”

For some reason, Baekhyun’s smile seemed to have turned into a smug grin—according to Chanyeol. “Can I use the car later then?”

Chanyeol was going to say yes, despite knowing that Baekhyun “didn’t have” a license I.D, but then he halted himself before agreeing. He wanted to know who this guy was; this guy that Baekhyun invited him over. “Is this ‘friend’ the one who called?”

“Yes,” Baekhyun nodded obediently.

Right then, Chanyeol’s attention was fully hooked. No way in hell was he letting Baekhyun take the car. Chanyeol wanted to see this guy for himself. He didn’t know why. There was just that urge in his gut. “Name.”

“Kai,” Baekhyun replied. “His real name’s Kim Jongin, but he goes by Kai—though sometimes I’ll coo and pet him like a dog, calling him Little Kim Kai, but that’s only when we’re watching a movie with dogs. He likes dogs, by the way. Big dogs, small dogs, fluffy dogs, corn dogs, hot dogs…Just anything with ‘dog’ in the name—”

“—Is he your boyfriend?” Chanyeol demanded to know.

Baekhyun exaggerated a sigh and glanced up. “Would be if he wasn’t so straight,” he said in the gayest manner he could. “But really, no. He’s just some kid I met around the circuit. But, back to the topic about the car—”

“I’ll pick him up,” Chanyeol announced.

“How swee—”

“Because I don’t trust you.”

Baekhyun’s cheerful face froze before he took a hand, ran it along Chanyeol’s arm, then patted his face. “Well, then, mange une bite quickly because he’ll be at the station in an hour.”


	11. The Dark Side

“What’re you still doing here!? He called. He’s already at the station!”

As Baekhyun nagged at him from the entry way to his room, Chanyeol just rolled his eyes as he kept his back turned, fixing his hair in the mirror. He checked his shirt to see if he got any last minute stains on the white shirt that he decided to change into. Chanyeol was fully aware that Baekhyun was watching him with an unpleased look. He became even more aware when Baekhyun started tapping his foot.

Fed up, Chanyeol turned his head. “What?”

“Nothing. I didn’t say anything,” Baekhyun replied with his arms crossed.

“Quit taping your foot, Baekhyun,” Chanyeol said as he turned back to the mirror.

“I will once you stop looking at yourself,” Baekhyun threw back. He sighed and entered Chanyeol’s room. “Kai’s at the station. You should’ve left ten minutes ago,” he grumbled as he set a knee on Chanyeol’s bed before climbing on.

“He can wait,” Chanyeol muttered. “It’s not my problem—”

“It is when you’re the one who offered to pick him up,” Baekhyun argued. “You know, if you just gave me the car, you wouldn’t have had to get changed, which is stupid, by the way.” Using the headboard, Baekhyun rose to his feet, standing on the bed. “Really. Why’d you have to get dressed anyways, Chanyeol? You’re not trying to impress him, are you?”

Chanyeol scoffed. “First impressions are important, Baek.” Finished and satisfied with his appearance, Chanyeol turned around to see Baekhyun lightly hopping on his bed. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Your bed’s springy,” Baekhyun commented, ignoring Chanyeol’s question. “What do you think the constant is for the spring?”

“What do you care about physics?” Chanyeol asked, giving Baekhyun an annoyed look. “Get off the bed unless you have the intention of continuing last night on it.”

Baekhyun laughed and jumped on the bed some more. “How much force does it take to break a bed?”

Chanyeol scrunched his brows. “Is that what you’re trying to do?”

“I’ll break your bed if you don’t leave the house right now,” Baekhyun threatened.

Chanyeol wasn’t in the mood for games. In fact, he wasn’t in the mood for anything when it came to Baekhyun. When Baekhyun landed on the bed again, Chanyeol reached, grabbed him by the foot and pulled, causing Baekhyun to fall back on the mattress.

“Fine. I’m leaving.” Then Chanyeol hovered over him for a second. “But when I get back, you better not act out just because I allowed this guy to come over. And once he leaves, Baek? It’ll be back to work. I might even add a few new rules just for you.”

“What about for Sehun and Kyungsoo?” Baekhyun asked with a grin as he sat up.

“I didn’t say anything about them.” Chanyeol gave Baekhyun one last look before grabbing a black jacket from the back of a chair and walking to the door. “Now get out.”

Baekhyun shrugged before he quickly walked past Chanyeol. After Chanyeol closed the door, he looked forward and saw Baekhyun waiting for him. He didn’t think that it was out of the ordinary even though Chanyeol wondered why Baekhyun even bothered to wait for him to close his door when it would’ve been normal for him to just ditch. But, Chanyeol didn’t have to wonder for long.

“Can you buy me a bike?”

Without bothering to sigh in stupid frustration, Chanyeol walked on. “No.”

“I just want some sort of transportation to town—”

Chanyeol stopped, causing Baekhyun to walk right into him. “What do you need to go into town for?”

Baekhyun shrugged. “Grocceries—”

“Kyungsoo can do that.”

“—and other stuff—”

“Sehun can get ‘other stuff’.”

Baekhyun huffed. “I need a cellphone.”

Chanyeol snorted before continuing to walk. “Why? You don’t have any friends.”

“Rude,” Baekhyun said, falling into step with Chanyeol. “I have Kai.”

“Your only friend.”

The two of them emerged from the hall and Chanyeol was quick to grab his car keys from where they hung out in the open, which he made a mental note to change. Before Baekhyun came along, the placement of those keys was fine. But now, it was different. The keys were too much in Baekhyun’s reach.

“So is that a yes?” Baekhyun asked, trying to manipulate the situation. At the front door, Chanyeol quickly slipped on his shoes. He still hadn’t answered Baekhyun so Baekhyun took the liberty of saying, “I’ll be expecting a bike sometime this week.”

Chanyeol opened the door and stepped out. Before he made his way to his car in the driveway, he remembered something. Turning to Baekhyun who was leaning against the door frame, Chanyeol said, “Sunglasses. Get them.”

Baekhyun groaned, but nonetheless waddled his way over to where Chanyeol had the habit of leaving things that could be quickly taken off. Once he came back, he stuck his hand out. Just as Chanyeol was leaving, Baekhyun called out, “Really, though. Can I get a bike?”

Chanyeol paused. “Do you really want to ride a bike ten miles just to get to town?”

“I’d rather drive a car—”

“But you have no license.”

Baekhyun’s lips thinned into a smile. “Let’s take this conversation up later. Kai’s still at the station.”

“No, this conversation’s done. You’re not getting a bike or a cellphone. You don’t need either and I don’t feel like giving you anything.” After he reached his car, Chanyeol pulled the door open. “What does this guy look like?”

“Like a beautiful sex god,” Baekhyun said, tilting his head to the right.

Chanyeol frowned. Like a beautiful sex god? Chanyeol was about done with Baekhyun. He got into his car and backed from the driveway, not bothering to wave back when Baekhyun started waving his hand goodbye.

Arriving at the station, Chanyeol began to wonder what “Kai” really looked like. When he looked around, there were only three people sitting in the waiting shed—an old guy, a woman, and the guy who had the most likeliness to be “Kai”.

Driving up to the pickup curb, Chanyeol slowed the car into a halt. He opened the door and stood up, leaving a leg still inside the car. He waved an arm, trying to get the attention of the male who wasn’t a woman, nor an old senior man.

When the guy finally looked up, Chanyeol motioned a hand. “Are you Kai?” he called curtly.

Kai looked around as if he suddenly forgot his own identity. He stood up from his seat and began to hesitantly walk toward the car. “Yes…?”

Chanyeol waited for Kai to open the passenger side, but when all he did was glance around and stand near the door, Chanyeol frowned. “Aren’t you getting in?”

“Uh…” Kai looked from the car to Chanyeol, meeting him in eye contact. “I don’t mean to offend, but I don’t know if I should.”

Chanyeol reached up and took his glasses off. “Baekhyun couldn’t pick you up.”

“But he told me—”

“Baekhyun couldn’t pick you up,” Chanyeol repeated. “I’m picking you up instead. Now get inside.”

Kai bit his lips for a second before nodding. He took his backpack off and got inside the car, setting his bag on the floor with his legs. Chanyeol followed soon after, but watched as Kai tried to settle himself.

It took a while before Chanyeol realized he was taking notice of details. His eyes travelled from Kai’s hair and facial features to his lean body and sense of style. In the back of his mind, Baekhyun’s “like a beautiful sex god” description kept repeating and repeating. It was because of those words that Chanyeol cursed for two reasons: Baekhyun’s correct description and Baekhyun’s choice of description. Without even waiting for Kai to put on his seat belt, Chanyeol put the car on drive and started going, letting Kai fall into the hands of inertia.

Chanyeol drove for five minutes, letting the awkward silence linger in the air. Sometimes he’d glance over at Kai, who would tap his lap with his fingers. No conversation went on with them for the longest time. What kind of conversation could Chanyeol even strike up? Chanyeol wasn’t about to ask Kai why he was even friends with someone like Baekhyun. He just figured that the guy was equally as weird and deranged as his maid.

“So…you’re like Park Chanyeol…” Kai muttered. Chanyeol almost stepped in the brakes. He turned his head momentarily at Kai, who reluctantly looked back. “I wasn’t aware that you were the Park that Baekhyun kept mentioning… Park’s a pretty common name.”

Chanyeol pursed his lips and his grip on the wheel got tighter. “So you know me.”

“Well, not until recently…”

Half-interested, Chanyeol raised his brows. “Recently?”

“You know, on the entertainment news channels…about you…and Baekhyun—”

Chanyeol halted the car in the middle of the desolate road. “What?”

“Is Baekhyun really working for you?” Kai asked, not paying mind to Chanyeol’s outburst. “I told him about the maid opening at your house, but…he’s like your fiancé. You must’ve seen him walk in and immediately recognized each other.”

Sighing, Chanyeol stepped on the gas again. “Baekhyun doesn’t know.”

Kai blinked. “He doesn’t know that you’re…?”

“He doesn’t know about us. He doesn’t know that I’m the fiancé on the other side. I don’t know why,” Chanyeol muttered. “Did you say that you recommended him the job opening?”

Kai nodded. “Did he tell you that he ran away? He was staying with me for a while, but I told him he needed to get a job. I overheard a few maids while working. That’s how I found out. I gave the info to Baek and that’s how he got to you.”

Chanyeol didn’t know how to feel. A small part of him wanted to strangle Kai because, in reality, it was all Kai’s fault that he had Baekhyun to deal with every day. Clicking his tongue, Chanyeol glanced over. “What’s your relationship with Baekhyun?”

Shrugging, Kai leaned back. “I don’t know…We’re just casual friends.”

Chanyeol didn’t like that word. “Casual” meant a lot of things, but then he had to remind himself that he wasn’t supposed to butt in on other people’s business. Then he realized that with Baekhyun being his fiancé, it was his business.

“Casual as in what? Sex casual?”

Kai almost choked on his own saliva. “What?”

“Do you prefer ‘friends with benefits’ or—”

Kai shivered. “I’m not like that—we’re not like that. Baekhyun’s just someone I met in the catering circuit. His parents would host parties and hire the company I worked for.” Kai rubbed his head before he asked for clarifications. “Wait, so let me get this right. You’re Park Chanyeol from Park Inc. He’s Byun Baekhyun from Byun Enterprise. You’re supposed to get married, but Baekhyun left because he didn’t want to marry you. I in-avertedly sent him to work for you. You know who he is…but he doesn’t know who you are.”

“That’s just about right,” Chanyeol muttered.

“How does he not know you?” Kai asked, though the question was directed more at himself.

Nearing the house, Chanyeol slowed the speed down. “I don’t know, but it should stay that way.”

Kai saw the house. He would’ve been impressed if he hadn’t seen plenty of other large houses in his old line of work. “Why’d you tell me everything?” he asked, out of curiosity.

“Because,” Chanyeol said, slowly pulling up, “when you mentioned that you knew me—including the fact that you mentioned hearing about Baekhyun and I on the news—I knew that I needed to fill you in so I could bring you on my side.”

“Your side?”

Chanyeol slowly parked the car in the drive way. “Listen, Kai, I didn’t want you accidentally slipping information out to Baekhyun until I get the information I want. I want to know if he has a deeper motive to being here other than to just ‘work’. For all I know, you could be in on this, too.” From the corner of his eye, Chanyeol saw Baekhyun push the curtains from the front window, smiling at them—or more accurately, at Kai. “Do me a favor? Shut up about what you know while you’re here. I don’t want the freaky bastard to run off.”

Kai laughed. “You don’t want him to run off? What, do you like him already?”

Chanyeol scoffed. “That’s stupid. No. I don’t want his parents finding him. If they don’t find him, the marriage deal will fall apart. Then, he won’t have to marry me and he’ll be free to do whatever he wants. The best part is that I don’t have to marry him, therefore saving my sanity.”

Opening the door, Kai asked a final question. “Does he make you crazy?”

Chanyeol rolled his eyes as he stepped out. “Y—”

Like everything that Chanyeol tried to do—whether that was trying to work, sleep, or have sex—Baekhyun cut him off short. The front door slammed open and Baekhyun’s voice cooed a “welcome!” for Kai, annoying Chanyeol.

Where the hell was his greeting?


	12. Fantastic Elastic

With arms wide open, Baekhyun made his way out the door and headed straight for Kai. Kai walked around the front of the car and was in the midst of opening his arms for Baekhyun. Just before Baekhyun could greet Kai with a hug, Chanyeol grabbed the back of his shirt and started dragging him back towards the front.

Kai opened his mouth to say something, but the look on Baekhyun’s face made it seem like he was used to having his happiness shot dead by the tall man. Instead, Kai just wordlessly followed the two. He didn’t bothering speaking up on Baekhyun’s behalf because of the way Baekhyun decided to shoulder bump Chanyeol into the door frame so he could go inside first. As Chanyeol’s entire body was shoved off to the side, Kai watched, realizing that Baekhyun could handle himself, but that Chanyeol couldn’t handle him.

Once inside the house, Kai was careful to take off his shoes, but once he stopped and looked around, he couldn’t help but be in awe. “Wow…Nice house.”

Baekhyun grinned at him and tilted his head. “Thanks!”

Chanyeol glanced his way as he was putting his jacket in the closet. Thanks? The guy was acting like he owned the place. The last time Chanyeol checked, the house was under his name, not Baekhyun’s.

Before Chanyeol could say anything, Baekhyun went over to Kai and tugged on him by his shirt’s sleeve. “Let’s go to my room.”

Kai hesitated. He was about to go along with Baekhyun’s pull, but then he noticed two other people in the area looking at him. One of them was standing near the kitchen island and was looking at him with big eyes. The other one was blond, looking at him through the sliding door from outside.

“Um.” Kai cleared his throat. “Shouldn’t you introduce me first?”

Baekhyun smiled. “Sure.” His smiled turned a little sarcastic when he looked at Chanyeol. “Well, that’s that guy.”

Kai and Chanyeol were mentally thinking that Baekhyun would say more, further introducing Chanyeol by his full name, but it wasn’t so. Baekhyun quickly moved on, shattering both of the males’ expectations.

“That’s Kyungsoo. He’s the cook. He’s also that guy’s you know what,” Baekhyun said, adding a suggestive wink to Kai, causing Chanyeol to dart his eyes at him in a suspicious, yet confused manner. “The kid outside?” he continued, waving a hand at Sehun. “That’s Sehun.” Leaning into Kai’s ear, he whispered, “He waters flowers like no other…”

Pulling away, Baekhyun began to pull Kai along towards the hallway. “Everyone say good bye to Kai for a while,” he said in a cooing voice. “We’re going to talk in private for a minute.”

Kai glanced around, watching Kyungsoo raise his brows in amusement and watching Chanyeol burrowing his eyebrows, frowning with his jaw clenched tight. He had only been there a few minutes and he could already piece together what everyday life in that house must’ve been like.

As the two walked away from the main area of the house, Chanyeol was about to follow but Kyungsoo waved his hand and shook his head. “Let him go. You need to lay off him, Chanyeol,” Kyungsoo calmly said. “He’ll be back anyways.”

“They could be cavorting—”

“—or catching up with each other.”

Chanyeol groaned, shaking his head. “I’m going,” he mumbled.

“What are you planning on doing, Chanyeol?”

“I’m gonna go stand outside that fucker’s door,” Chanyeol answered back, moving for Baekhyun’s room.

“Like that’s not weird.”

Kai set his bag on the floor before taking a seat in the only chair in Baekhyun’s room. Baekhyun followed him with his eyes as he sat on his bed.

“I’m sorry. I don’t have anything else comfortable in this room. It’s pretty clear that he wants me to live in the stone age.” Baekhyun motioned his head to the window. “I can’t even open that window. I’m not ‘allowed to,’” Baekhyun complained, mocking Chanyeol’s deep voice.

Kai quirked his lips. “Should you talk about him like that? He is your—uh, boss.”

Baekhyun snorted and shrugged. “He doesn’t mind.”

“Are you sure about that…”

“Yeah,” Baekhyun said, nodding. “He loves it when I don’t treat him with respect.”

“Uh huh.” Kai fiddled with his fingers. “Okay, well listen. Did you talk to him about me? The job?”

“I haven’t gotten around to it.” Baekhyun hummed. “I’m sure he’ll take you in.”

“What if he doesn’t?”

“He will. One way or another.”

Kai gave Baekhyun a look. “Baek, after meeting the guy, I don’t think—”

“Shut up and let me handle it,” Baekhyun assured. He got up from his bed, walked over, and snatched Kai’s backpack up. “What’d you pack in here?”

“Nothing—Baek, stop rummaging through it!” Kai cried as he jumped off his seat.

Baekhyun, on the other hand, kept walking backwards, trying to buy time for himself to continue pulling and pushing things inside Kai’s bag. “Shirt, shirt, shirt—oh, some underwear.” Baekhyun rubbed his fingers on the fabric as he pulled it out, dropping the bag. “These feel new—are they new? What’s the brand?”

Kai groaned as he stalked over, trying to take the underwear from Baekhyun. “Yes, they’re new. Brand? I don’t know—Baek, come on.”

Back against the door, Baekhyun stretched the elastic. “What do you think the constant is for the elastic?”

“Baek,” Kai groaned.

“Does it fit all your junk?” Baekhyun asked, seriously. “Did you know that Luke Brooks—he’s in some band in Melbourne, Australia, which, by the way, has nice weather—anyways, he wore a speedo at a concert one time and one of his balls slipped out.” Baekhyun shrugged. “I just don’t want your balls slipping out, Kai.”

“They’re not going to if I’m wearing something over it,” Kai argued. He took a step, holding his hand out. “Now give it back. You’re stretching the bands.”

“I’m just admiring the elastic capacity of these underpa—”

Baekhyun cried in surprise when the door that he was leaning against was suddenly pushed open, pushing him on the wall next to it. Annoyed, Baekhyun pushed back against the door, hating himself for not bothering to lock it. He only stopped when a hand pulled him from behind the wooden structure.

“Hi,” Baekhyun piped, giving the tall, frowning giant a ray of sunshine.

“We need to talk,” Chanyeol curtly said. He turned his head over to Kai. “Take your bag and go wait out in the living room.” Dragging Baekhyun by the shirt, Chanyeol pulled them out to the hallway, heading to his room.

Practically kicking Baekhyun into the room, Chanyeol watched the guy stumble a bit as he closed and locked the door behind him. As Baekhyun was rubbing his neck, Chanyeol threw a sharp glare his way. “What’s this about a job?”

“Hm?”

“You promised him a job here,” Chanyeol clarified.

“Wow, you were eavesdropping,” Baekhyun said with an amused brow. “Rude.”

Chanyeol flicked Baekhyun’s lips, causing him to flinch. “What’s rude is giving false promises and leading people on.”

Cocking his head, Baekhyun gave Chanyeol a light punch on his chest—purposely where his nipple would be. “Is this about you, big guy?”

Chanyeol pushed Baekhyun’s hand away. “Stop trying to distract me.”

“You’re distracting yourself,” Baekhyun said, grinning.

Chanyeol rolled his eyes. “Stop it,” he growled. “So you told him he’d have a job here.”

“He got fired from his last job,” Baekhyun argued. “I’m just trying to be a friend.”

Chanyeol groaned, rubbing his forehead. “Baek, you can’t just tell your friends they have a job here if they ever get fired!”

Baekhyun batted his eyes twice. “Oh, I don’t know, Chanyeol. You did say that Kai was my only friend. What ‘friends’ are you talking about?”

Thinning his lips, Chanyeol gave Baekhyun a disapproving look. “You better go out there and tell that guy the truth.”

Baekhyun’s sarcastic bravado started to come down. “Chanyeol.”

“Don’t ‘Chanyeol’ me,” Chanyeol said. “Go out there and tell him.”

“Please?” Baekhyun tried. “You hired Sehun to water flowers. He does a good job at it, but seriously, Chanyeol. He gets paid the same amount I do just to get up in the morning and spend ten minutes watering things.” Baekhyun raised a brow. “Kai said he’ll do anything.”

“Baekhyun, I’m not hiring him!” Chanyeol cried. “Here’s the situation. You’re a misfit. You’re a misfit and now, you’re bringing another misfit in this house. But here’s the thing. I don’t want any fucking misfits in this house! You’re enough to deal with every moment of the day!”

“Chanyeol—”

“—You’re not getting a bike. You’re not getting a phone. You’re not going to get me to hire your damn boyfriend!” Chanyeol felt utterly frustrated. He didn’t know who he was feeling like at the moment, but right then he felt like a father to a dramatic and annoying teenage girl. “And I’ll kindly remind you that you don’t have any phone rights, you can’t masturbate, you can’t have other people in your room, and finally, you can’t open your window, which I know you do anyways since you forget to close it back sometimes, idiot.”

“He used to work for a catering company!” Baekhyun argued. “He can cook—assuming that he wasn’t lying to me—”

“Kyungsoo’s the cook—”

“Then hire Kai to stand by and blow on your food!” Baekhyun paused. “Wait, let him fan your food. Food absorbs in scent and air so maybe if Kai was chewing mint gum, your food would end up tasting minty and I don’t think that you’d—”

Chanyeol covered his mouth. “You need to stop spitting out facts.”

Pulling the hand off his mouth, Baekhyun smiled. “I’m only trying to increase your intelligence about the world. Since you stay cooped up in your work room every day, I worry that the only thing you ever think about are bolts, screws, and hydraulics.”

Chanyeol was caught off guard by the tone of Baekhyun’s voice, but forced himself back on track. “Thanks, but no thanks.” With his hand on the door knob, Chanyeol pointed a finger at Baekhyun. “Tell your friend that there’s nothing here for him.”

“Okay, fine. He doesn’t have to have a job. Can he just stay here?”

“There’s no room available.”

“Bull—” Baekhyun covered his mouth, stopping himself from cursing. Cursing would only decrease his chances of winning the argument. “Chanyeol, I clean your bathrooms. I know that there’s three bedrooms in this house with bathrooms that aren’t used. They aren’t occupied.” When Chanyeol kept standing there, giving him a blank look, Baekhyun threw his hands up. “Fine, you don’t wanna give a room? He can stay in mine! Like a dog. He can sleep on my lap and lick my face like a dog, too. It’ll be like having a pet.”

“Baek—”

Baekhyun gasped. “Kai can be like a pet! I mean, he does eat, poop, and sleep, which is what pets do. He also—”

“Oh my god,” Chanyeol groaned, slapping his forehead. “You are not getting a fucking human pet—damn that poor guy if you ever make him pretend like he’s a fucking dog!”

“Oh, what’s this? I can’t even own a pet,” Baekhyun said, putting his hands on his hips. “Excuse you. Did you know that Kai’s apartment complex at least allowed small critters and animals?”

“Yeah?” Chanyeol threw back sarcastically. “You keeping Kai as a ‘pet’ would be considered slavery.”

“Like you denying me of all my rights isn’t along that borderline?”

“Buying you a cellphone or getting you a bike isn’t a god given right, Baekhyun,” Chanyeol cried. “Damn it, it’s all about privilege!” He huffed. Then he noticed something in Baekhyun’s hand. “What the fuck is that?”

Baekhyun raised a confused brow and looked down. “Oh…” Baekhyun shrugged. “It’s just Kai’s underwear… It’s super elastic and I bet it fits nicely, too. I don’t know if the brand’s generic, but it’s—”

Waving a hand, Chanyeol dissipated Baekhyun’s words. “Nevermind. I don’t care why you have the guy’s underwear in your hands, which you shouldn’t even have so you better give it back to him when you march out of this room to tell him the truth.”

Knowing that he was losing the war, Baekhyun went up against Chanyeol, standing straight in front of him, meeting him in a stare down. “Chanyeol.”

“Baekhyun.”

Baekhyun thinned his lips. “He can work.”

“And you can go out there and tell him to find work somewhere else.”

Baekhyun frowned. “Chanyeol. Really.”

“Baekhyun. Really.”

Last resorts had to be used. Dropping Kai’s super elastic underwear on the floor, Baekhyun grabbed Chanyeol by the collar of his shirt. Standing on the tip of his toes, Baekhyun craned his head up while pulling Chanyeol down. Then he started to lick and nip at the bottom of Chanyeol’s lips.

Chanyeol was surprised by the current action. At first, he was going to immediately push back, but he then thought that he should just let Baekhyun do whatever he was trying to do, because in the end, he knew that he wasn’t giving into the guy.

And it was with this mindset that Chanyeol opened his mouth, taking dominance from Baekhyun, though he occasionally let the guy have control of the situation back again just to make him think that he had the upper hand.

When Baekhyun felt like he had teased Chanyeol into submission, he untangled his tongue, giving Chanyeol one last exaggerated smack on the lips before Baekhyun set his feet back on the ground and let go of Chanyeol’s shirt.

Pretending to wipe dust off of Chanyeol’s shoulders, Baekhyun looked up at him. “So am I getting a yes?”

Chanyeol smiled as he put a hand on Baekhyun’s back while reaching for the door knob. “That was nice and all,” he started, twisting the door open. “But the answer’s still no,” he finished just as he pulled the door open and herded them out of the room.

Chanyeol was a little taken aback by the fact that Baekhyun was walking right beside him as they made their way back to the main living area in silence. In his mind, he thought that Baekhyun was embarrassed for what he had done.

It wasn’t until they were near the kitchen that Baekhyun did something. He turned to Chanyeol and punched his employer right on the side. It hurt so bad that Chanyeol thought he had broken a rib and Kyungsoo had to calmly grab a paper towel to wipe the few droplets of tears on his face as Kai and Sehun watched in amusement at the entire scene.


End file.
